TH 
FIRST  S 
FOR  LIBE 


CORPORAL 
OSBORNE 
dcVARILA 


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in  2007  with  funding  from 

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•n 


Corporal  Osborne  de  Varila 
Battery  C,  Sixth  Field  Artillery 


THE  FIRST  SHOT 
FOR  LIBERTY 


THE  STORY  OF  AN  AMERICAN 
WHO  WENT  OVER  WITH  THE 
FIRST  EXPEDITIONARY  FORCE 
AND  SERVED  HIS  COUNTRY  AT 
THE   FRONT 


By 
CORPORAL  OSBORNE  DE  VARILA 

Battery  C,  Sixth  U.  S.  Field  Artillery , 
Who  fired  the  first  shot  of  the  American  Army 


ILLUSTRATED 


all  ■> 
•  J  »  »  » 
»i     1       *» 


THE  JOHN    C.  WINSTON  COMPANY 

PHILADELPHIA  CHICAGO 


A 


Copyright,  1918,  bt 
THE  JOHN  C.  WINSTON  CO, 


•  ••-/••  • 
;  ••  ••    t  -v. 


tf. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    I  Join  the  Colors 9 

II.    Off  for  France 20 

III.  With  Pershing  in  France S2 

IV.  A  Royal  Welcome 40 

V.    Over  the  Hurdles 50 

VI.    Off  to  the  Front 60 

VII.    The  First  Shot  for  Liberty 69 

Vin.    The  Infantry  in  Action 80 

IX.    Feeling  Out  the  Hun 93 

X.    Clashes  with  the  Enemy 101 

XI.    Camp  Life 112 

XII.    Back  to  the  Front 121 

Xin.   SCOTTY,  THE  IRREPRESSIBLE 130 

XIV.    German  Atrocities 140 

XV.    Strafing  the  Enemy 153 

XVI.    The  Gas  Attack 164 

XVII.    Yankee  Heroes 173 

XVIII.    The  American  Raid 183 

XIX.    French  War  Crosses 190 

XX.    Back  to  the  U.  S.  A 204 

Trench  Talk  217 


(«) 


3935cS5 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

Corporal  Osborne  de  VARHiA Frontispiece 

PAGE 

We  Gambled  for  Positions  at  the  Side  Doors.    48 

The  Empty  Cartridge  from  which  the  First 

Shot  was  Fired 78 

Sergeant  Hugh  Marsh  Illustrates  Life  in 
THE  Trenches 94 

McNiCHOL  Wrote  Back:    "Lizzie,  I'll  Get  a 
Hun  for  You  or  Bust" 126 

Diagram  Showing  the  Arrangement  op  the 
Modern  Trench  System 184 

I  Soon  Returned  with  the  Grenades 194 


(7) 


The  First  Shot  for  Liberty 

CHAPTER  I 
I  Join  the  Colors 

SOME  of  my  buddies  have  the  super- 
stitious belief  that  destiny  picked  me 
to  fire  the  first  gun  for  the  United 
States  in  the  war  against  the  Hun. 

Personally,  I  take  very  little  stock  in 
destiny,  fate  or  any  of  those  things  of  the 
occult,  around  which  sentimental,  half-baked 
novelists  like  to  weave  impossible  yarns. 

According  to  my  understanding  of  the  case, 
I  was  selected  to  send  Uncle  Sam's  first  shell- 
message  to  the  Kaiser  because  I  put  in  many 
weeks  of  hard  training,  and  got  to  know 
every  twist  and  wrinkle  in  the  disposition 
and  temperament  of  my  French  "75." 

But,  just  to  give  the  romantists  a  little 
consolation,  I  will  concede  that  I  come  of  a 
race  of  red-headed,  freckled-faced  fighters, 
and  am  proud  of  it. 

My  father,  Walter  de  Varila,  was  a  United 

(9) 


10    '  Ttlfi' f  lliSt  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

States  cavalry  scout  in  the  early  seventies,  and 
helped  to  round  up  the  Apaches  in  Arizona. 

Dad  was  a  red-head,  and  had  freckles  as 
big  as  copper  cents.  He  was  a  fighter,  and 
a  good  one  too,  as  United  States  Army 
records  will  show.  Hemmed  in  by  savages, 
while  on  one  of  his  scouting  expeditions,  he 
cut  his  way  out  in  a  running  fight,  using  two 
Colt's  revolvers  to  excellent  advantage.  The 
Indians  dubbed  him,  "Red  the  Brave." 

My  grandfather  on  the  paternal  side  fought 
for  the  Confederacy  under  General  "Stone- 
wall" Jackson;  he  had  hair  like  burnished 
copper.  My  mother's  father  served  the 
Union  under  Grant. 

There  was  a  red-haired  de  Varila  with 
"Mad  Anthony"  Wayne  when  he  stormed 
Stony  Point,  and  a  pair  of  sorrel-topped, 
lusty  de  Varilas,  delivered  hammer-blows  for 
democracy  of  the  pioneer  brand,  in  the  French 
Revolution. 

Every  one  of  these  fighting  de  Varilas  had 
freckles  as  well  as  red  hair — God  bless  them 
all. 


I  JOIN  THE  COLORS  11 

My  mother  was  of  Irish  descent,  and  my 
father  French. 

Now,  you  need  wonder  no  longer  why  I  love 
to  fight  when  the  fighting  is  good.  When 
you  get  a  French  and  Irish  combination, 
and  breed  it  for  several  generations  on  the 
stimulating  soil  of  the  good  old  United 
States,  you  are  bound  to  produce  something 
that  absolutely  refuses  to  "let  George  do 
it,"  when  there  is  a  scrap  on  deck. 

I  was  fifteen  years  old  when  the  Kaiser 
and  his  gang  of  international  burglars  set 
out  to  crack  the  safes  of  the  nations  of  the 
world,  and  revive  the  chain-gang  methods 
of  the  unholy  old  Roman  Empire. 

I  wanted  to  get  into  it  then,  honest  I  did, 
although  I  had  just  blossomed  out  in  my 
first  suit  of  long  trousers,  and  was  proudly 
wearing  my  first  dollar  watch. 

My  hair  always  has  a  habit  of  bristling  like 
a  cat's  tail  when  I  scent  a  scrap,  and  when 
the  Kaiser  started  to  reach  through  Belgium 
to  get  at  the  throat  of  France,  I  could  feel 
that  red  alfalfa  of  mine  crinkle  all  over. 


n     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

The  hair  of  some  folks  bristles  when 
they  get  scared.  It  is  just  the  opposite 
with  me.  When  mine  starts  to  lift  up,  I'm 
just»  fighting  mad.  My  mother  has  told  me 
that  it  was  always  that  way  with  the  de 
Varilas. 

My  buddies  in  the  battery  over  in  France 
used  to  get  a  lot  of  fun  watching  my  hair 
when  I  got  real  warmed  up  with  my  French 
"75"  gun,  and  was  pumping  shells  into  the 
Boche  first  line  trenches.  They  found  the 
eflfect  particularly  startling  one  day,  when, 
in  the  height  of  a  battle,  I  put  on  my  gas 
mask.  After  that,  they  called  me  "The 
Little  Red  Devil." 

But  that  is  pushing  ahead  of  the  yarn. 

As  I  started  to  say,  I  felt  the  old  de  Varila 
fighting  itch  when  the  German  Emperor 
began  to  blast  his  way  through  Belgium, 
burning  cities,  blowing  up  villages,  and  kill- 
ing women  and  children. 

Maybe  it  was  the  blood  of  some  of  those 
French  ancestors  stirring  in  me  and  urging 
me  to  do  something  for  France,  but  more 


I  JOIN  THE  COLORS  13 

likely  it  was  that  unbeatable  combination — 
American,  Irish  and  French. 

I  stood  it  as  long  as  I  could,  and  then  I 
told  my  mother  I  was  going  to  Canada  to 
enlist.  I  let  her  know  I  thought  it  was  a 
disgrace  for  a  fighting  de  Varila  to  be  wasting 
his  time  going  to  school  while  a  bunch  of 
boodling  Huns  were  running  loose  over 
Belgium  and  France,  and  doing  murder 
wholesale. 

I  could  see  that  she  liked  to  hear  me  talk 
that  way,  for  there  were  tears  in  her  eyes,  and 
she  gave  me  one  of  those  warm,  motherly 
smiles  that  make  an  American  boy  in  his 
first  long  trousers  feel  that  he  has  suddenly 
grown  three  inches  taller  and  is  a  man.  But 
of  course  I  did  not  realize  then  that  no 
sensible  mother  is  going  to  enthuse  very  much 
about  sending  a  fifteen-year-old  son  into  the 
gore  of  battle. 

But  she  understood  her  boy  all  right,  and 
didn't  argue  with  me.  She  snaked  a  freshly 
baked  mince  pie  out  of  the  oven,  and  told  me 
to  scoot  to  the  back  steps  and  gorge  myself. 


14      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

It  was  a  mighty  good  pie  of  the  mother-used- 
to-make  kind,  and  in  the  eating  I  almost  for- 
got about  the  Kaiser  and  the  Belgians. 

A  few  months  after  mother  had  camouflaged 
the  de  Varila  fighting  itch  with  mince  pie,  I 
was  packed  oflF  to  a  prep,  school  at  Los 
Angeles. 

I  found  the  school  a  regular  incubator  for 
the  war  spirit. 

There  were  a  couple  of  English  lads  there 
who  received  frequent  letters  from  relatives 
in  the  thick  of  the  fighting  in  France.  The 
Britishers  used  to  sneer  at  us  American  lads 
because  Uncle  Sam  wouldn't  get  into  the 
fight  for  civilization. 

I  was  obliged  to  lick  one  of  them  to  make 
him  stop  saying  rotten  things  about  Uncle 
SanMny.  I  have  often  wondered  if  the  Eng- 
lisher  I  pummeled  knows  that  the  Reddy  de 
Varila  who  blacked  his  eyes  on  that  memorable 
day  is  the  same  de  Varila  who  fired  the  first 
shot  for  Uncle  Sam  against  the  Boche.  If 
he  does,  maybe  he  has  forgiven  me  for  the 
licking  I  gave  him.    I  am  certain  that  by  this 


I  JOIN  THE  COLORS  15 

time  he  has  taken  back  all  the  unkind  things 
he  said  about  Uncle  Sam. 

I  warmed  up  good  and  plenty  when  our 
Uncle  Sammy  told  the  German  Ambassador 
to  pack  up  his  duds  and  clear  out  for  Germany. 
I  couldn't  concentrate  on  my  studies  after 
that.  The  print  on  my  lesson  books  became 
blurred,  and  all  I  could  see  were  marching 
troops  and  maneuvering  battleships. 

But  the  bottom  dropped  clean  out  of  my 
education  when  Congress  bucked  up  to  the 
occasion  and  declared  the  United  States  at 
war  with  the  German  Empire. 

Wow!  Every  fighting  de  Varila  in  the 
whole  list  of  de  Varilas  seemed  to  rise  up  before 
me  in  spirit  and  announce: 

"Now  is  the  time  to  get  in,  my  boy.'* 

That  settled  me ;  I  determined  to  get  into  the 
scrap  while  the  getting  was  good.  I  was  eight- 
een then,  and  big  for  my  age.  All  I  needed 
was  my  mother's  signature  to  precipitate  me 
into  the  biggest  war  in  history.  I  packed  my 
suitcase,  went  home  and  told  my  mother  I 
\Jv^as  going  to  enlist  in  the  United  States  Army. 


16     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

She  was  game  and  didn't  even  blink  a 
tear.  And  why  shouldn't  she  be  game?  She 
was  Irish,  her  father  had  fought  under  Grant, 
and  besides,  she  had  married  a  de  Varila. 

"You  are  a  de  Varila,"  she  said,  "and  I'd 
be  ashamed  of  you  if  you  didn't  want  to  go. 
Your  father  and  both  your  grandfathers  went 
in  when  they  were  eighteen." 

Her  voice  shook  a  little  bit,  and  the  next 
morning  I  noticed  her  eyes  were  a  trifle  red. 

I  enlisted  in  Battery  C,  Sixth  Field  Artillery, 
U.  S.  A.,  April  25,  1917,  nineteen  days  after 
the  United  States  jumped  into  the  war. 

I  was  as  proud  as  a  six-year-old  boy  just 
learning  to  whistle  when  the  army  doctors 
looked  me  over  and  decreed  I  was  as  sound 
as  copper  from  head  to  toe. 

I  was  hustled  off  to  the  recruiting  barracks 
at  Angel  Island  in  'Frisco  Bay,  and  was 
inoculated  and  vaccinated.  I  was  pretty 
miserable  for  about  a  week  from  the  different 
brands  of  anti-disease  virus  which  they 
pumped  under  my  hide,  and  on  the  whole  I 
felt  like  an  animated  fever  blister.     But  just 


I  JOIN  THE  COLORS  17 

as  soon  as  the  effects  of  the  virus  wore  away  I 
developed  the  appetite  of  an  army  mule,  and 
took  on  weight  like  a  woman  who  is  kidding 
herself  with  one  of  those  anti-fat  treatments. 

We  were  given  full  equipment,  including 
uniform,  underwear,  leggings,  shoes,  mess 
kit  and  blankets,  and  shipped  to  Douglas, 
Arizona.  For  eight  days  we  raw  recruits 
were  kept  shut  up  in  a  quarantine  camp,  and 
after  that  followed  weeks  of  arduous  training 
on  the  Mexican  border.  It  was  a  tough 
grill,  but  it  made  every  man-jack  of  us  hard 
as  rocks. 

Our  training  embraced  bareback  riding, 
instruction  in  the  use  of  equipment,  and  the 
grooming  of  horses.  We  were  given  an  idea 
of  the  various  parts  of  the  field  pieces,  and 
engaged  in  battery  drill  and  target  practice 
with  three-inch  guns.  We  put  in  a  lot  of 
work  on  those  guns,  little  thinking  that  we 
would  handle  an  entirely  different  kind  of 
field  piece  when  we  arrived  in  France. 

I  became  the  driver  of  the  lead  team  of  the 
first   section   field  piece,   and   before   many 


18      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

weeks  had  passed  I  could  maneuver  that 
piece  like  a  veteran.  By  listening  to  the 
fiery  rhetoric  of  some  of  the  old-time  drivers 
in  the  battery,  I  learned  there  are  certain 
cuss  words  which  have  a  special  and  most 
effective  meaning  to  artillery  horses,  and  I 
sometimes  used  them  with  wonderful  results. 

But  say,  I  hate  to  think  about  the  early 
stages  of  that  bareback  training.  It  was 
fierce,  worse  than  anything  I  encountered 
later  on  the  battle  front.  Our  battery  was 
afflicted  with  positively  the  most  evil-minded, 
devilish-dispositioned  horses  on  earth.  Hon- 
est, I  believe  that  German  propagandists 
had  been  working  among  every  one  of  the 
nags,  for  how  they  did  hate  us! 

No  one  can  tell  me  that  the  horse  doesn't 
possess  the  power  of  thinking  like  a  human 
being.  The  way  my  nag  used  to  scheme  to 
break  my  neck  rivaled  the  machinations  of 
the  villain  in  a  melodrama.  Every  time  the 
nag  tossed  me  into  the  desert  sand  among  the 
cactus,  he  would  grin  and  toss  up  his  heels 
in  the  most  fiendish  manner. 


I  JOIN  THE  COLORS  19 

During  the  first  few  days  of  the  bareback 
riding,  I  hadn't  the  sHghtest  desire  to  sit 
down,  and  couldn't  have  if  I  had  wanted  to. 
There  was  a  httle  comfort  in  knowing  I  had 
company  in  my  misery,  for  all  of  the  raw 
recruits  ate  their  chow  standing  up  as  I  did. 
But  as  time  wore  on  I  became  toughened  to 
the  work,  and  developed  a  contempt  for  a 
nag  that  lacked  ginger. 

All  this  time,  as  you  can  imagine,  we  were 
getting  keyed  up  for  war.  We  longed  for 
action  and  waited  impatiently  for  the  day  when 
we  would  receive  orders  to  move  eastward. 

The  latter  part  of  July,  1917,  one  of  my 
buddies  rushed  into  my  tent  one  night,  and 
said  excitedly: 

"Reddy,  we're  off  for  France  tomorrow." 

I  thought  he  was  kidding  me,  but  no,  the 
news  was  buzzing  all  over  the  camp,  and  the 
next  morning  we  "entrained  for  parts 
unknown." 

We  all  knew  what  that  meant — we  were 
going  to  France,  going  overseas  to  put  the 
Yankee  punch  into  the  fight  against  the  Hun. 


CHAPTER  II 
Off  for  France 

WE  were  boiling  over  with  the  fight 
spirit  as  we  slid  over  the  rails 
toward  the  east  coast. 

The  weeks  of  training  in  the  dry,  bracing 
air  of  Arizona  had  steel-plated  our  constitu- 
tions and  lifted  our  morale  to  the  twentieth 
story.  Every  fiber  of  our  bodies  ached  for 
a  try  at  the  Hun;  we  felt  then  that  our 
regiment,  unaided,  was  capable  of  turning 
the  tide  against  the  Boche. 

We  gave  our  pals  husky  blows  across  the 
back  and  told  what  we  were  going  to  do  when 
we  bored  our  way  into  Berlin. 

"When  I  get  to  Berlin  town,"  said  a  giant 
artilleryman  from  Montana,  "I'm  going  to 
drop  everything  else  and  put  in  my  time  hunt- 
ing for  the  Kaiser.  Remember  now,  he's  my 
meat;  I'm  going  to  settle  with  that  bloody  old 
boy,  and  I  don't  want  any  interference." 

(«0) 


OFF  FOR  FRANCE  21 

"YouVe  got  no  monopoly  on  this  Kaiser- 
killin'  job,"  retorted  a  gunner  from  Kansas. 
"You've  got  to  walk  fast  if  you  beat  this 
buddy  out  looking  for  his  royal  highness,  the 
chief  butcherer  of  Berlin." 

This  sort  of  talk  may  sound  foolish,  but 
it  showed  the  excellence  of  our  spirits.  We 
were  ready  for  anything — ^the  rougher  the 
better.  I  believe  we  were  about  as  reckless 
an  outfit  of  artillery  roustabouts  as  ever 
moved  toward  a  battle  front. 

The  trip  overland  was  one  continuous 
ovation  from  Douglas  to  the  Atlantic  port 
where  we  embarked.  At  every  stop,  even  at 
the  tank  stations,  enthusiastic  Yankees  pulled 
the  hero  stunt  on  us,  flowing  into  our  trains 
and  overwhelming  us  with  fruit,  candy  and  pa- 
stry. Everybody  wished  us  God-speed  in  our 
mission  against  the  Hun.  All  this,  of  course, 
lifted  our  war  spirit  several  more  notches. 

At  three  o'clock  one  morning  we  piled  off 
our  trains  in  an  Atlantic  port,  and  marched 
on  to  a  transport.  The  ship  pulled  down  the 
channel  and  anchored. 


22     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

We  remained  there  for  two  days,  and  they 
were  blamed  tiresome  days.  We  couldn't 
see  any  sense  in  this  delay  at  getting  a  whack 
at  the  Hun.  I  growled  with  the  best  of 
them,  for  the  Boche  hate  had  taken  a  heavy 
grip  on  me.  In  me  was  a  deep-seated  feeling 
that  I  would  not  be  content  until  I  had 
planted  both  feet  on  French  soil.  I  suppose 
some  of  my  buddies  would  say  that  it  was 
destiny  pulling  me  on  to  fire  the  first  gun 
for  liberty.  I'll  confess  that  I  did  have  a 
feeling  I  was  needed  on  the  other  side  to  help 
start  the  ball  a-rolling  for  Uncle  Sam. 

Every  mother's  son  of  our  lusty  crew  of 
Boche  haters  gave  an  ear-ringing  yell  of  joy 
when,  at  sunset  on  the  second  day,  the  trans- 
port weighed  anchor  and  steamed  slowly  out 
of  the  harbor. 

Off  to  the  fight-country;  it  seemed  almost 
too  bully  good  to  be  true.  I  felt  like  kicking 
myself  to  see  if  it  wasn't  all  a  dream  from 
which  I  would  soon  awaken  and  find  myself 
in  that  rather  dull  prep,  school  in  Los  Angeles. 

Most  of  us  were  a  trifle  glum  as  we  saw  the 


OFF  FOR  FRANCE  23 

coast-Hne  of  Yankeedom  fade  away  in  the 
violet  mists  of  evening,  but  not  long  did  we 
hearties  mope.  Out  of  the  east  stiff,  salty 
breezes  brought  to  us  a  smell  of  adventure 
that  jacked  up  our  spirits  like  draughts  of 
sparkling  wine. 

Here  at  last,  I  thought,  I  am  afloat  in  the 
sea  of  mystery  and  danger — the  sea  which 
for  three  years  had  been  the  theater  of  events 
which  had  vibrated  the  world. 

Hundreds  of  miles  to  the  eastward,  I  knew 
that  destroyers  prowled  about  on  the  alert 
for  the  treacherous  submarine,  while  cruiser 
and  battleship  fleets  patrolled  wide,  watery 
areas,  effectually  bottling  up  the  battle 
squadrons  of  the  Kaiser. 

I  was  supremely  content  as  I  hung  over  the 
rail  and  watched  the  foam  churn  over  the 
bow.  About  a  mile  ahead,  a  United  States 
cruiser  of  the  latest  model  rode  the  seas 
majestically,  while  on  our  flanks  Yankee 
destroyers  saucily  plowed  the  waves. 

"Uncle  Sam  is  on  the  job,"  I  said  enthusi- 
astically to  my  buddy.  Sergeant  Pasquale 


24     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

Atillo,  a  young,  Intelligent  New  York  Italian, 
one  of  the  best  artillerymen  in  the  battery. 

"You  can  bet  your  bottom  dollar  Uncle 
Sam  is  on  the  job,  Reddy, "  he  replied.  "Mr. 
Submarine  has  about  as  much  chance  of 
poking  in  on  our  game  as  a  Jersey  mosquito 
has  of  drilling  through  one  of  the  steel  plates 
of  this  transport." 

I  was  mighty  lucky  to  have  the  sergeant  for 
my  buddy,  for,  aside  from  being  one  of  the  best 
chaps  that  ever  rode  an  artillery  caisson,  he  was 
a  competent  man,  and  it  was  largely  through 
his  instruction  that  I  was  promoted  to  cor- 
poral after  the  regiment  landed  in  France. 

This  war  has  opened  my  eyes  to  the  fact 
that  the  sons  of  our  immigrants  have  the 
makings  of  absolutely  top-notch  Americans. 

This  is  being  demonstrated  every  day  on 
the  western  battle  front  in  Europe,  where 
they  are  fighting  and  dying  in  the  cause  of 
Liberty.  And  before  this  war  is  over  we  are 
going  to  take  off  our  hats  many  times  to  the 
lads  who,  in  ante-bellum  days,  we  rather 
contemptuously  classed  as  foreigners. 


OFF  FOR  FRANCE  25 

Believe  me,  they  are  proving  themselves 
Yanks  of  the  first  water,  every  one  of  them. 
Some  of  them  are  wobbly  in  their  Enghsh, 
but  they  are  backing  up  the  spirit  of  Wash- 
ington and  Lafayette,  just  as  if  their  ancestors 
had  played  heavy  parts  in  the  American 
Revolution.  When  we  have  the  Kaiser 
interned  in  Sing  Sing  prison,  and  the  nations 
of  the  world  have  returned  to  peaceful  pur- 
suits, we  are  going  to  show  our  appreciation 
for  what  these  lads  have  done  for  their 
adopted  country,  or  I'm  a  poor  prophet. 

There  was  only  one  fly  in  our  ointment  on 
the  trip  over,  and  that  was  the  chow,  which, 
for  the  first  few  days  was  about  the  worst 
ever  ladled  out  a  ship's  kettle.  It  smelled 
to  the  heavens,  did  that  chow,  and  before  we 
were  two  days  out,  a  third  of  the  outfit  were 
groaning  in  their  bunks  with  dysentery  and 
other  ailments  of  the  digestive  organs. 

We  bellowed  long  and  loud  to  the  head 
chef,  a  big,  fat  darkey,  who  didn't  know  as 
much  about  cookery  as  a  longshoreman. 

We  might  just  as  well  have  complained  to 


26      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

the  ship's  anchor  or  the  keel  of  the  transport. 
The  chow  grew  worse  and  more  of  the  boys 
went  to  the  mat. 

I  have  a  stomach  as  vigorous  as  a  blast 
furnace,  but  it  balked  at  the  kind  of  stuflF 
that  was  being  served  up  in  the  mess-room. 
I  saw  I  would  have  to  do  something  to  keep 
out  of  the  sick  bay,  so  I  decided  upon  a  little 
strategy. 

I  was  on  pretty  good  terms  with  an  under- 
cook by  the  name  of  Sam,  and  for  two  bits  a 
day  he  supplied  me  with  chow  from  the 
oflScers'  mess.  I  let  my  buddy,  the  sergeant, 
in  on  the  graft,  and  a  little  before  mealtime 
we  would  steal  away  to  the  boiler-room  and 
eat  the  food  which  had  been  cached  there  by 
Sam. 

The  best  in  eatables  on  the  ship  was  pur- 
loined for  us  by  the  ebony  rascal,  and  my 
buddy  and  I  waxed  fat  and  comfortable  while 
our  comrades  howled  in  increasing  volume 
at  the  steady  decline  of  the  chow. 

Of  course  the  sergeant  and  I  had  to  yelp 
and  complain  with  the  rest  so  as  not  to  excite 


OFF  FOR  FRANCE  «7 

suspicion.  If  the  bunch  had  discovered  our 
little  game  they  would  have  mobbed  us.  We 
felt  like  a  pair  of  Judases  at  first,  but  under 
the  influence  of  that  good  food  our  consciences 
became  covered  with  rawhide.  I  have  always 
noticed  that  a  well-filled  stomach  is  the  best 
conscience  soother  in  the  world. 

Things  came  to  a  ripping  climax  on  the 
third  day  when  the  rascally  chef  served  a 
concoction  which  he  labeled,  "Irish  stew." 
The  stuflf  was  an  insult  to  the  Irish  race. 
Several  of  the  boys  gagged  and  beat  it  to  the 
deck  rail  the  minute  they  got  a  whiff  of  the 
steaming,  stinking  mess,  while  downright 
murder,  and  nothing  else,  gleamed  in  the 
eyes  of  other  artillery  huskies. 

As  for  me,  wretch  that  I  was,  I  pounded 
on  the  mess  table  and  yelled: 

"Boys,  this  thing  has  gone  far  enough; 
I'm  willing  to  die  for  my  country  on  the 
field  of  battle,  but  I'll  be  blamed  if  any 
lump-headed,  fumbling,  jackass  of  a  nigger 
cook  is  going  to  shuflBe  me  off  with  a  kettle 
full  of  ptomaine  bugs." 


28     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LE5ERTY 

If  the  lads  had  known  that  only  ten  min- 
utes before  I  had  polished  off  a  good  square 
meal  in  the  seclusion  of  the  boiler-room,  they 
would  have  lynched  me.  But  they  didn't 
know  it. 

My  words  had  an  immediate  effect,  for 
they  were  ripe  for  murder,  pillage  and  every- 
thing else  in  the  category  of  lawlessness. 

"Right  you  are,  Reddy,"  yelled  a  buddy 
from  Michigan.  "I  move  we  hang  that 
rotten  cook  to  the  yard-arm.  He's  out  to 
get  a  sea  funeral  for  all  of  us,  and  he'll  accom- 
plish his  purpose  if  we  don't  get  him  first." 

"There  ain't  any  yard-arm  on  this  ship," 
observed  an  old  artilleryman,  "but,  boys, 
we  can  lift  him  to  the  crow's-nest  and  drop 
him  off  into  the  brine." 

"To  the  crow's-nest  with  the  black  beggar," 
chorused  the  desperate  crew,  and  the  rush 
was  on  into  the  galley. 

The  big  chap  from  Michigan  led  the  band. 
He  was  a  ferocious  looking  object  as  he 
jabbed  viciously  at  the  air  with  a  pair  of 
table  forks. 


OFF  FOR  FRANCE  29 

But  the  chef  heard  the  uproar  and  the 
rush  of  feet  down  the  stairs.  He  must  have 
suspected  that  a  day  of  reckoning  was  coming 
up  cannon-ball  express,  for  he  scrambled  up 
another  companionway  and  gained  the  deck. 
So  great  was  his  haste  that  he  took  along 
with  him  a  great  wooden  ladle  from  which 
hung  threads  of  dough. 

The  boys  were  hot  on  the  trail  and  they 
reached  the  deck  just  in  time  to  see  the  white 
coat-tails  of  the  chef  disappearing  around  a 
corner  of  the  chart  house.  The  chase  was 
now  on  in  earnest.  Up  and  down  companion- 
ways,  through  the  main  saloon,  down  into 
the  engine-room  and  back  up  again  to  the 
deck,  the  chef  ran  for  his  life  with  the  pack  of 
enraged  artillerymen  at  his  heels. 

Finally,  exhausted,  the  terrified  negro 
plunged  head  first  into  the  cabin  of  the 
commanding  officer,  bellowing: 

"Save  me,  for  de  Lord's  sake,  save  me." 

"What  does  this  mean.^"  asked  the  colonel 
sternly  as  he  surveyed  the  panting,  per- 
spiring artillerymen  gathered  about  his  door. 


30      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"It  means  just  this.  Colonel,"  spoke  up  a 
gunner  who  had  just  arrived  from  the  mess- 
room.  He  stepped  forward  with  a  bowl  of 
the  stuff  that  had  been  served  as  stew. 

"Just  take  a  whij0F  of  this.  Colonel,"  he 
said.  "It's  the  kind  of  chow  that  black 
rascal  has  been  serving  up  ever  since  we  left 
land." 

The  colonel  did  take  a  whiff,  and  he  drew 
back  with  an  expression  of  disgust. 

"Well,  I  should  say  so,"  he  observed. 
Then  he  turned  to  the  chef  and  said  angrily: 

"That's  not  fit  to  feed  to  pigs;  you  are  sus- 
pended until  I  have  a  chance  to  investigate." 

The  colonel  did  investigate,  and  he  found 
that  the  men  in  the  culinary  quarters  never 
washed  the  kettles.  Bits  of  food  were 
allowed  to  lay  in  the  bottom  of  the  pots  and 
decompose.  Fresh  food  was  put  right  in  on 
top  of  this  mess,  cooked  and  served  up  to  the 
boys.  It's  a  wonder  that  the  ptomaine  bugs 
didn't  get  us  all. 

The  chef  was  laid  off  the  job  for  the  rest 
of  the  voyage,  and  we  had  no  further  trouble 


OFF  FOR  FRANCE  31 

with  the  chow.  However,  the  sergeant  and 
I  continued  to  get  our  private  stock  from  the 
boiler-room  cache. 

The  day  after  the  chef  was  fired  out  of  the 
galley  in  high  disgrace,  a  shrill  call  rang  out 
from  one  of  the  lookouts  of  the  transport! 

"Periscope  on  the  port  bow." 


CHAPTER  III 

With  Pershing  in  France 

ADYNAMIC  thrill  ran  through  every 
mother's  son  of  us. 

Here,  at  last,  we  were  face  to  face 
with  that  dread  mechanical  monster  of  the 
deep — the  German  submarine. 

Stinging  with  excitement,  we  crowded  to 
the  rail  and  strained  our  eyes  to  port  over  the 
dancing  sea. 

All  was  a-bustle  on  the  transport;  oflScers 
issued  sharp,  quick  orders,  while  the  gunners 
swung  their  pieces  and  felt  for  the  range. 
Sailors  in  blue  yanked  the  lids  from  munition 
boxes  and  lifted  out  shells. 

The  cruiser  ahead  swung  about,  pointed 
her  prow  due  north,  and  forged  along  swiftly 
in  response  to  the  quickening  of  her  engines. 
The  guarding  destroyers  darted  about  like 
eager  hounds  searching  for  a  quarry  that 
had  temporarily  eluded  them. 

(82) 


WITH  PERSHING  IN  FRANCE  33 

"This  IS  the  life,"  I  heard  a  comrade  say 
through  gritted  teeth. 

I  stood  tense,  expecting  every  second  to 
hear  a  shell  go  screeching  out  into  the  brine. 

About  a  quarter  of  a  mile  away  I  could  see 
something  sticking  up  out  of  the  sea. 

*'That  rubberin'  periscope,"  I  thought; 
"I  hope  we  make  a  direct  hit." 

Then  came  the  sickening  reaction. 

"False  alarm;    nothing  but  one  of  those 

d n  porpoises, "  cried  the  lookout,  lowering 

his  glasses. 

A  groan  of  disgust  ran  through  the  ship. 

"Wouldn't  it  make  you  sick.?"  observed  a 
Calif ornian.  "Here  we  were  all  primed  for 
the  best  movie  of  our  lives,  and  the  lights 
go  out  and  the  screen  goes  on  the  blink.  I'd 
Kke  to  skin  that  hell  of  a  porpoise." 

As  for  me,  I  was  as  mad  as  a  devil,  for  I 
felt  that  our  trip  across  would  not  be  complete 
without  a  good  warm  argument  with  one  of 
Germany's  U-boats. 

Anyway,  that  was  our  introduction  to  the 
much-talked-of  submarine  zone. 


34     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

A  porpoise  at  a  distance  does  look  very 
much  like  a  spying  periscope,  and  the  pesky 
mammals  fooled  our  lookouts  several  times 
before  we  reached  France.  But  then,  these 
instances  only  showed  that  our  men  were 
ever  on  the  alert  for  the  Kaiser's  under-the- 
sea  dogs. 

Our  officers  took  no  chances  while  we  were 
passing  through  the  territory  of  the  U-boat. 
For  three  nights  the  transport  traveled  with- 
out lights,  and  our  guardians,  the  cruiser 
and  the  destroyers,  redoubled  their  vigilance. 
We  were  routed  out  of  our  bunks  at  three  a. 
M.  on  each  of  those  three  days,  and  were  com- 
pelled to  remain  on  deck  until  seven  a.  m.  with 
our  life  preservers  buckled  on  and  our  shoes 
and  trousers  unlaced.  The  favorite  time  for  the 
average  submarine  to  attack  is  around  dawn. 

We  didn't  sight  a  single  U-boat  all  the  way 
over,  but  we  had  a  lot  of  fun  at  the  expense 
of  these  sneaking  craft.  Naturally  we  were 
all  thinking  about  subs  when  we  entered  the 
zone,  and  hardly  an  hour  would  pass  but  that 
some  jokester  would  yell: 


WITH  PERSHING  IN  FRANCE  35 

"Hey,  boys,  there's  a  sub.'* 

Then,  we  fall  guys  would  crowd  to  the  rail 
and  put  our  eyes  out  looking  for  periscopes. 

I  was  taking  my  turn  at  poker  one  day 
around  noon  when  the  submarine  chestnut 
came  along  and  caught  me  an  awful  wallop. 
My  hand  was  a  pretty  good  one — well  it 
was  nothing  less  than  a  royal  flush,  something 
which  had  never  before  rubbed  acquaintance 
with  me  during  my  brief  experience  as  a 
poker  player. 

I  was  about  to  proceed  with  this  poker 
knockout,  when  a  voice  screeched  at  my 
elbow: 

"Holy  smoke,  lads,  here  comes  a  torpedo; 
going  to  hit  us  *  midships.'" 

Zowie!  I  was  on  my  feet  in  an  instant, 
dashing  my  cards  on  the  table.  The  other 
players  followed  suit. 

We  did  our  little  Marathon  to  rail,  only  to 
find  that  we  had  been  properly  guyed  again. 

When  we  returned  to  the  table,  of  course 
we  found  the  cards  all  mixed  up,  and  had  to 
make  a  new  deal.     I  spent  an  hour  looking 


36      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

for  the  jokester,  but  he  was  wise  enough  to 
stay  out  of  sight  until  I  had  cooled  down. 

One  of  the  breeziest,  brightest  little  per- 
sonalities on  the  ship  was  our  chaplain,  a  man 
by  the  name  of  Dixon  from  Illinois.  That 
fellow  was  just  one  human  bottle  of  sunshine, 
with  the  cork  out  so  that  the  glad  stuflF  could 
pour  out  and  warm  up  the  whole  boat. 

Well,  the  chaplain  sure  did  love  that  song, 
"Uncle  Sammy."  Every  time  he  found  a 
bunch  of  us  together  he  would  say  with  one 
of  his  blithe  smiles: 

"A  cigarette  for  every  boy  who  will  sing 
'Uncle  Sammy.'" 

We  would  obediently  yelp  all  three  verses 
of  the  song,  and  after  we  had  roared  forth  the 
last  stanza,  the  little  chaplain  would  deal  out 
the  cigarettes.  We  dubbed  him  "Uncle 
Sammy, "  though  he  didn't  look  any  more  like 
Uncle  Sam  than  the  man  in  the  moon.  He 
really  looked  like  a  pocket  edition  of  Theodore 
Roosevelt,  with  his  eye-glasses,  moustache 
and  gleaming  teeth,  which  he  displayed 
abundantly  when  he  smiled. 


WITH  PERSHING  IN  FRANCE  37 

It  was  the  ambition  of  the  chaplain  to 
have  us  go  ashore  in  France  singing  the 
"Marseillaise"  in  French,  and  he  drilled  us 
with  this  song  every  afternoon.  There  were 
a  few  in  the  outfit  who  had  good  voices,  but 
the  majority  couldn't  have  qualified  for  the 
choir  of  the  corner  church  in  Podunk.  And 
the  way  we  slipped  and  slid  over  those 
French  words  would  have  worn  the  nap  oflf 
any  ordinary  man's  patience.  But  the  chap- 
lain had  patience  that  made  Job's  seem  thin 
in  comparison.  He  kept  at  us  hammer  and 
tongs  until  once  in  a  while  we  made  a  direct 
hit  on  a  French  word.  The  chaplain  would 
reward  us  with  one  of  his  Rooseveltian  smiles 
and  hand  around  the  smokes. 

The  ship  was  a-throb  with  excitement  on 
August  13th  when  we  sighted  a  thin  blue 
line  on  the  horizon* — the  coast  of  France. 

"Hip!  hip!  hurrah!  France,"  yelled  a 
gunner,  and  we  joined  him  in  a  deafening 
roar  of  cheering. 

"Now  for  the  Hun,"  I  said  to  my  buddy, 
the  sergeant. 


38     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"We'll  soon  be  in  his  bailiwick,"  he  replied 
with  a  glad  grin. 

Then  my  buddy  said  something  which  I 
have  thought  of  a  good  deal  since  that  mem- 
orable day. 

"Do  you  know,  Reddy,"  he  said,  "I  beheve 
you  are  going  to  do  well  over  here." 

"Not  any  better  than  yourself  or  anybody 
else,"  I  replied,  trying  to  be  modest. 

"Oh,  I  don't  know,"  he  said  with  an  air 
of  seriousness:  "I've  a  hunch  you  are  going 
to  do  something  big." 

"  Can  that  stuff,  Buddy, "  I  observed,  trying 
not  to  show  my  pleasure  at  his  words. 

On  the  day  after  I  opened  the  war  for 
Uncle  Sam,  my  friend  the  sergeant  grasped 
me  by  the  hand  and  said: 

"Didn't  I  tell  you,  old  man,  you  were 
going  to  do  something  real  over  here?" 

But  that  is  getting  ahead  of  my  story. 

The  excitement  grew  as  our  transport 
swept  nearer  the  French  coast.  Soon  we 
could  make  out  dozens  of  neat  little  white 
houses    with   red    tile    roofs — all    against    a 


WITH  PERSHING  IN  FRANCE  39 

background  of  beautiful  green.  It  was  a  sight 
good  for  sore  eyes. 

A  warlike  touch,  was  given  the  scene  as  we 
neared  the  entrance  of  the  harbor. 

Two  big  French  airplanes  advanced  to 
meet  us,  flying  low  and  scanning  the  water 
closely  for  hostile  submarines.  It  was  a 
dangerous  spot,  the  entrance  of  that  harbor. 
Only  the  day  before  we  learned  later,  a 
German  U-boat  had  sneaked  close  in  and 
sunk  a  supply  ship. 


CHAPTER  IV 

A  Royal  Welcome 

IT  was  evident  that  our  approach  had 
been  well  heralded,  for  the  docks  were 
dense  with  people,  and  on  public  build- 
ings, dwellings  and  warehouses,  hundreds  of 
American  and  French  flags  were  snapping 
to  the  breeze. 

Quaint  little  French  fishing  boats  swarmed 
about  the  transport,  and  the  occupants  of 
these  craft  were  the  first  to  greet  us. 

These  fishermen  were  very  picturesque  in 
their  rakish,  red  tam-o-shanters  and  corduroy 
trousers  rolled  up  to  the  knee.  They  wore  a 
red  scarf  about  the  waist,  and  their  feet  were 
bare.  The  faces  of  these  foreign-looking 
men  were  wreathed  in  smiles;  they  jabbered 
and  gesticulated  after  the  manner  of  the 
French,  shrieking  questions  at  us,  which  we 
did  not  in  the  least  understand. 

One  of  them  became   so   excited  that  he 

(40) 


A  ROYAL  WELCOME  41 

forgot  to  steer  his  boat,  and  the  craft  rammed 
another,  and  was  upset,  throwing  the  fisher- 
man into  the  water.  We  threw  a  line  to  the 
capsized  party  and  pulled  him  dripping  and 
gasping  to  the  deck  of  the  transport.  We 
gave  him  a  hilarious  reception,  slapping  his 
damp  back  and  shouting ,"  Howdy,  Frenchy.?" 
He  replied  with  a  torrent  of  enthusiasm  in 
his  own  language,  and  a  wide  smile  unfolded 
under  his  queer  little  eyebrow  of  a  moustache 
when  we  filled  his  hand  with  American  coins. 
He  stayed  on  the  boat  until  we  docked  and 
did  not  seem  to  worry  in  the  least  about  the 
fate  of  his  smack  which  he  had  left  upset  in 
the  harbor. 

In  the  meantime,  the  French  aircraft  had 
wheeled  about  and  were  following  the  trans- 
port, serving  as  a  sort  of  rear  guard.  The 
United  States  cruiser  rode  proudly  ahead  and 
the  destroyers  steamed  behind  us. 

It  sounded  pleasant  and  warlike  to  hear 
the  buzzing  of  the  motors  aloft.  •  We  yelled 
greetings  to  the  airmen,  and  they  peered  at 
us  through  their  goggles  and  waved  in  reply. 


42     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

They  were  flying  so  low  that  we  could  almost 
talk  to  them. 

Dense  crowds  were  lined  up  on  both  banks 
as  we  passed  through  the  first  locks.  There 
were  quaintly  dressed  peasant  women  who 
made  me  think  of  the  pictures  of  Puritan 
dames  in  my  history  book  back  in  'Frisco. 
They  wore  prim  white  caps,  exceedingly  tight 
bodices,  wide  skirts  and  wooden  shoes.  The 
little  girls  were  pocket  editions  of  their 
mothers  and  big  sisters. 

The  men  were  attired  in  velveteen  coats, 
corduroy  trousers  and  sabots.  The  whole 
scene  put  me  in  mind  of  a  grand  opera  I  had 
once  attended  in  'Frisco. 

The  populace,  so  as  to  speak,  went  wild 
as  we  slipped  through  the  locks,  our  band 
playing  alternately  the  "Star  Spangled  Ban- 
ner," and  the  "Marseillaise." 

Men  ripped  their  gaudy  scarfs  from  their 
waists  and  waved  them  frantically;  women 
and  girls  fluttered  their  handkerchiefs,  and 
American  and  French  flags  were  in  evidence 
everywhere. 


A  ROYAL  WELCOME  43 

We  could  easily  gather  by  the  actions  of 
these  good  people  that  we  were  the  best 
things  they  had  looked  upon  for  a  long  time. 
There  was  something  pathetic  and  childish 
about  their  joy.  Many  of  them  sobbed  like 
children,  they  felt  so  glad  to  see  us  Yanks, 
and  I  did  not  blame  them  when  I  thought  of 
what  they  had  been  through  the  past  three 
years. 

Sons,  brothers  and  fathers  from  this  city 
had  died  by  the  thousand  on  the  front  line, 
along  with  other  loyal  Frenchmen.  Li  the 
coming  of  the  Americans  these  poor  folks 
saw  hope  and  a  prospect  of  a  turning  of  the 
tide  against  the  invading  Boche. 

Our  fighting  edge  was  sharpened  when  we 
glimpsed  the  depth  of  their  welcome.  We 
couldn't  understand  a  single  syllable  of  the 
jargon  they  tossed  to  us,  but  we  took  it  for 
granted  that  it  was  all  complimentary  and 
consoled  them  with  good  old  United  States. 

"Take  heart,  you  folks,  for  we're  going  to 
paste  hell  out  of  the  Boches,"  yelled  an 
artilleryman. 


44      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

'* Uncle  Sam  is  on  the  job  now,"  cried 
another  Yank. 

We  docked  that  night,  but  were  not 
allowed  to  go  ashore.  But  the  Frenchies 
seemed  determined  that  we  should  feel  the 
welcome  of  France,  even  though  we  were 
penned  up  aboard  ship.  They  swamped  us 
with  baskets  of  fruit  and  bouquets  of  flowers. 
Soon  the  old  transport  looked  like  a  florist 
shop,  and  we  consumed  fruit  until  we  were 
threatened  with  colic. 

The  Yankee  spirit  of  exploration  and 
adventure  got  the  best  of  some  of  the  boys 
that  night,  and  they  slid  down  ropes  to  the 
dock.  Some  of  them  were  grabbed  by  the 
marine  sentries  and  returned  to  the  ship, 
but  most  of  them  penetrated  into  the  city, 
returning  before  morning  and  bringing  glowing 
reports  of  the  hospitality  of  the  French. 

"  Great  place,  this  France, "  said  one  of  the 
night  prowlers,  a  little  thickly,  upon  his  re- 
turn. **  Folks  in  this  burg  wouldn't  let  me  pay 
for  a  blamed  thing;  never  saw  so  much  wine 
in  my  life.     It  must  rain  booze  in  these  parts." 


A  ROYAL  WELCOME  45 

We  landed  the  following  day — ^August  14, 
1917,  and  I  shall  never  forget  the  event.  At 
this  same  port,  the  first  detachment  of  Gen- 
eral Pershing's  forces  put  in  nearly  two 
months  previous,  on  June  26,  1917,  and  they 
were  received  like  a  lot  of  gods.  But  the 
novelty  of  seeing  Americans  had  not  yet  worn 
off,  and  the  inhabitants  of  the  port  gave  us 
quite  as  rousing  a  reception  as  they  did  the 
first  arrivals. 

It  was  a  clear,  beautiful  morning  as  we 
marched  down  the  gangplanks,  singing  the 
"Marseillaise"  with  an  ardor  that  nearly 
prostrated  "Uncle  Sammy,"  our  chaplain, 
with  pride  and  joy. 

Well,  say,  those  Frenchies  fairly  mobbed  us. 

Shouting,  "Vive  le  Amerique,"  they  made 
for  us  as  if  we  were  something  good  to  eat. 

The  first  thing  I  knew,  a  middle-aged 
woman  in  peasant  costume  had  swung  her 
arms  around  my  neck  and  was  kissing  me 
first  on  one  cheek  and  then  another.  Any- 
body would  have  thought  I  was  a  long-lost 
son.     I  tried  to  pry  her  loose,  but  she  had  a 


46     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

grip  like  iron,  and  I  had  to  grin  and  bear  it 
until  she  let  go. 

But  the  thing  was  not  over  by  any  means; 
it  now  developed  into  a  matter  of  taking 
turns.  No  sooner  had  the  elderly  woman  let 
go  my  neck,  when  another  pair  of  arms 
flopped  around  my  collar,  and  I  started  to 
run,  but  I  changed  my  mind  when  I  got  a 
good  look. 

And  you  woiJd  have  changed  your  mind 
too  if  you  had  been  in  my  place.  The  pret- 
tiest girl  in  France  had  annexed  herself  to  my 
neck.  My  eyes  told  me  that  there  couldn't 
be  a  prettier  girl  in  France  than  she  was. 
Her  hair  was  as  black  as  a  crow's  wing;  her 
eyes  were  big  and  brown,  and  her  red  lips 
pouted  up  at  me  invitingly. 

I  am  an  American  and  do  things  in  a  hurry. 
I  gave  her  a  smack  that  must  have  been  heard 
at  the  battery  in  New  York.  She  blushed 
and  then  kissed  me  on  both  cheeks  and  let  go. 
And  I  am  frank  to  say  I  was  sorry  to  see  her  go. 

The  next  in  the  line-up  was  an  excitable, 
Frenchy-looking  -  chap    with    a    goatee    and 


A  ROYAL  WELCOME  47 

eyeglasses.  He  had  his  Hps  pursed  up  like  an 
interrogation  point,  and  he  was  making  for 
me,  full  steam  up.  I  blocked  his  approach 
with  a  twist  of  my  elbow,  for  I  suspected  his 
design. 

"Nothing  doing,  Frenchy,"  I  said.  "Over 
where  we  come  from  men  don't  kiss  each 
other." 

He  evidently  didn't  understand  and  tried 
to  sneak  in  under  my  guard,  but  I  shook  a 
fist  warningly  in  his  face. 

"Lay  off,"  I  yelled,  "or  I'll  soak  you  one." 
He  saw  I  meant  business  and  abandoned  his 
kissing  offensive. 

Of  course  I  knew  it  was  the  custom  of 
everybody  in  France  to  kiss,  but  I  made  up 
my  mind  not  to  get  used  to  men  saluting  each 
other  on  the  cheek 

That  night  we  slept  in  an  open  field  in  our 
blankets.  It  was  bully  to  feel  solid  ground 
once  more  and  know  that  we  were  close  to  the 
fighting  zone. 

We  remained  there  a  week,  stretching  our 
legs  and  resting  from  our  voyage.     Of  course 


48      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

we  were  impatient  at  the  delay,  for  we  wanted 
to  beat  it  to  the  front  immediately  and  take 
a  hand  in  the  big  scrap 

We  were  elated  at  the  end  of  the  week 
when  we  were  loaded  into  funny  little  box 
cars,  which  were  about  half  the  size  of  the 
American  brand.  We  were  packed  so  tightly 
that  we  barely  had  standing  room,  and  had 
to  shove  and  squirm  before  we  could  create 
space  big  enough  to  sit  down.  Nevertheless 
we  were  in  high  spirits  and  were  glad  to  be  on 
the  move. 

We  gambled  for  the  positions  at  the  side 
doors,  and  I  was  lucky  enough  to  win  a  seat 
in  the  open  several  times.  Our  chow  on  the 
trip  consisted  of  corn  beef,  tomatoes  and 
hardtack,  and  at  some  of  the  stations  on  the 
route  we  received  handouts  of  steaming  hot 
coflFee. 

We  passed  through  a  pretty  rolling  country, 
dotted  with  towns  and  villages.  We  saw 
very  few  young  men,  for  most  of  them  were  at 
the  front  doing  their  bit  against  the  Hun. 
The  work  on  the  farms  was  being  done  mostly 


A  ROYAL  WELCOME  49 

by  old  men,  women  and  children.  The 
inhabitants  gathered  at  every  station  to  see 
us  pass  through. 

After  traveling  for  three  days  we  reached 
the  end  of  the  line,  where  American  auto 
trucks  took  us  to  the  best  artillery  barracks 
in  France.  That  night  we  hit  the  hay  on 
real  mattresses  and  real  pillows. 

But,  best  of  all,  we  were  near  the  front  line, 
and  could  hear  the  boom  of  heavy  guns. 

Every  one  of  us  felt  a  thrill  when  we 
realized  that  only  a  few  miles  away,  French 
batteries  were  potting  away  at  the  Germans. 

We  were  all  eager  to  start  at  once  for  our 
positions  behind  the  French  line,  but  such  a 
happy  fate  was  not  in  store  for  us.  We  learned, 
to  our  grief,  the  next  day  that  we  would  have 
to  undergo  many  weeks  of  stiff  grilling  under 
the  most  exacting  French  artillery  instructors 
before  we  would  be  allowed  to  pepper  away 
at  the  hated  Boche. 


CHAPTER  V 

Over  the  Hurdles 

OUR  barracks  were  located  in  a  village 
near  the  Swiss  border.  It  was  a 
hilly,  wooded  country,  and  the  air 
was  as  bracing  as  new  wine. 

There  was  not  the  slightest  delay  in  starting 
our  training.  The  morning  after  our  arrival 
we  drew  French  horses  and  French  guns  and 
caissons,  and  hiked  to  a  park  where  some 
French  artillery  instructors  were  awaiting  us. 

Our  first  work  was  to  break  the  horses  to 
harness.  It  was  the  hardest  job  I  ever 
tackled,  for  the  nags  didn't  understand  a  word 
of  English.  So  we  had  to  start  right  in  and 
teach  those  animals  how  to  take  orders  in 
the  language  of  the  United  States. 

Some  of  the  fellows  had  brought  French 
grammars  over  with  them,  and  they  tried 
out  some  of  the  French  words  on  the  horses. 
But  their  pronunciation  was  so  punk  that  the 


OVER  THE  HURDLES  51 

nags  didn't  savvy  at  all.  As  driver  of  the 
lead  piece,  I  had  my  troubles,  as  you  can  well 
imagine. 

The  horse  may  be  the  most  intelligent  of 
the  beasts,  as  the  naturalist  tells  us,  but  he  is 
no  linguist,  and  can't  carry  more  than  one 
language  in  his  noodle  at  the  same  time. 
Before  you  can  graft  a  new  lingo  into  his 
brain  you  have  to  kill  off  the  old  one,  and  that 
is  the  method  I  followed  with  my  nags.  I 
gave  orders  that  nothing  but  United  States 
be  talked  to  the  horses,  and  every  time  I 
caught  a  Frenchy  "parlevoing"  to  them  I 
blew  up  and  asked  him  what  in  thunder  he 
meant  by  butting  in  on  my  educational  system. 
I  guess  the  first  United  States  words  the 
nags  learned  were  "damn"  and  "hell,"  for 
I  confess  I  used  both  pretty  freely  at  the 
start  of  the  instruction. 

I  had  to  laugh  when  I  looked  at  the  French 
75-millimeter  guns,  they  seemed  so  small  and 
inferior  when  compared  with  our  American 
field  pieces. 

"If  we  have  to  use  those  toys,"  I  thought. 


52     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"the  Huns  won't  do  a  thing  to  us  when  we 
get  into  action." 

But  I  underwent  a  radical  change  of  opinion 
after  several  days  of  target  practice  with  the 
little  fire-eaters.  I  found  that  we  could  do 
faster  and  more  accurate  work  with  them 
than  with  the  more  warlike  looking  American 
pieces.  It  is  certain  that  the  Germans  know 
to  their  cost  what  the  little  "75's"  are  capa- 
ble of  doing. 

With  my  buddy,  the  sergeant,  to  help  me, 
I  put  in  some  hard  work  on  the  guns,  prac- 
ticing with  the  sights  and  getting  familiar 
with  the  parts.  It  was  my  ambition  to  be  able 
to  send  accurate  shell  messages  into  Boche- 
land.  My  buddy  was  enthusiastic,  and  said 
he  had  never  seen  anybody  get  along  so  fast. 

"I  can't  get  it  out  of  my  head,  Reddy,"  he 
said,  "  that  you  are  going  to  make  your  mark 
over  here." 

"You  make  me  blush,  old  top,"  I  replied. 
But  his  words  gave  me  a  lot  of  encourage- 
ment, although  I  knew  that  he  was  just 
trying  to  make  me  feel  good. 


OVER  THE  HURDLES  «8 

The  hard  work  soon  won  its  reward,  for  on 
September  1,  1917,  I  was  made  a  cannoneer. 
I  was  the  proudest  buddy  in  the  whole  Ameri- 
can army  when  I  got  that  boost. 

On  the  day  of  my  promotion  I  was  turned 
over  to  a  little  French  sergeant,  who  had  the 
reputation  of  being  one  of  the  best  artillery- 
men in  France.  His  English  was  insignifi- 
cant, but  his  gestures  were  eloquent,  and  I 
picked  up  fast  under  him.  He  knew  the 
French  "  75"  like  a  jeweler  knows  a  watch. 
Among  the  things  I  learned  from  him  was 
how  to  clean  and  how  to  disable  the  gun  in 
case  it  was  threatened  with  capture  by  the 
Huns.  I  learned  to  love  that  little  "75'^  as  a 
man  loves  his  horse  or  his  dog. 

A  few  days  later  I  was  made  a  corporal, 
and  then  my  joy  was  complete.  I  wouldn't 
have  changed  jobs  with  the  chief  marshal  of 
the  French  army.  In  a  battery  the  corporal 
sets  the  deflection,  sees  that  the  cross  hair 
is  on  the  target  and  fires  the  gun.  Already 
I  had  visions  of  mashing  in  Boche  front-line 
trenches  and  making  direct  hits  on  German 


54      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

munition  dumps.  I  wanted  to  move  my 
little  "  75  "  right  up  to  the  front  line  at  once 
and  begin  the  devilment. 

The  way  we  Yanks  progressed  with  the 
guns  amazed  our  French  instructors.  It 
may  sound  like  boasting,  but  it  is  a  fact  that 
in  a  few  weeks  we  learned  all  they  knew,  and 
in  target  practice  we  dumbfounded  them  by 
the  number  of  our  direct  hits.  It  is  true  that 
the  American  gunners  are  the  best  in  the 
world.  They  have  a  truer  eye,  a  steadier 
hand  and  work  more  quickly  and  accurately 
than  the  artillerymen  of  any  other  nation. 
We  demonstrated  that  after  we  had  been  on 
the  front  line  but  a  few  days,  and  when  Ameri- 
can batteries  get  going  good  over  there, 
Germany  is  going  to  realize  that  the  Yanks 
are  on  the  job.  American  gunners  are  going 
to  deliver  the  knockout  to  Von  Hindenburg's 
forces. 

Now  I  will  give  you  a  little  idea  of  our 
every-day  life  in  that  little  French  village  on 
the  Swiss  border.  Reveille  sounded  at  4  a.  m., 
and  we  bounded  out  of  our  bunks  and  had 


OVER  THE  HURDLES  56 

cold  showers.  We  engaged  in  setting-up 
exercises  until  6  a.  M.,  when  mess  was  served. 
Gun  drill  started  at  7  o'clock  and  lasted  until 
11.30  A.  M.  Then  we  knocked  off  for  mess 
again,  and  went  back  to  the  guns  at  1  o'clock, 
drilling  until  6  p.  m.,  when  we  had  the  evening 
meal.  After  that  we  were  free  until  4  o'clock 
the  next  morning. 

The  villagers  used  us  very  generously  until 
some  of  the  artillerymen  learned  to  speak 
French  fairly  well  and  put  them  wise  to  the 
pay  we  were  getting.  Then  they  thought 
every  American  soldier  was  a  millionaire 
and  began  to  soak  us  in  the  matter  of  prices. 
I  heard  a  story  which  illustrates  the  price- 
gouging  of  Americans  pretty  well. 

A  French  soldier  went  into  a  shop  in  the 
village  and  asked  the  price  of  a  souvenir 
handkerchief. 

"  Five  francs, "  said  the  shopkeeper. 

"Too  high,"  grunted  the  Frenchman,  and 
he  walked  out. 

A  Canadian  soldier  went  In  andpriced  the 
same  handkerchief;    he  was  told  he  could 


56     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

have  it  for  twenty-five  francs.  He  left  without 
buying. 

An  American  soldier  was  the  next  to  call. 

"How  much?"  asked  the  Yankee,  picking 
up  the  handkerchief  which  had  been  turned 
down  by  the  Frenchman  and  the  Canadian. 

"Fifty  francs,"  replied  the  shopkeeper, 
without  the  flicker  of  an  eyelid. 

"Give  me  five  of  them,"  said  the  Yank, 
reaching  for  his  wallet. 

The  village  where  we  were  billeted  had 
short,  crooked,  narrow  streets.  Most  of  the 
houses  were  plain,  bare  structures  made  of 
stone,  covered  with  plaster.  The  roofs  were 
all  of  tile.  In  the  center  of  the  village  was  a 
church,  with  a  figure  of  the  Virgin  set  in  the 
front  of  the  building,  and  a  statue  of  Jeanne 
d'  Arc  in  a  little  plot  in  the  back.  There  were 
always  wreaths  of  flowers  at  the  feet  of  both 
these  statues. 

The  houses  and  stables  were  built  around  a 
courtyard,  and  the  courtyard  is  used  for 
dumping  refuse.  Around  this  courtyard 
centers   the   activities   of  each  family   unit. 


OVER  THE  HURDLES  67 

Like  as  not,  the  cow  resides  next  door  to  the 
parlor,  and  the  horse  next  to  the  kitchen.  This 
may  be  a  very  handy  arrangement,  but  from  a 
standpoint  of  sanitation  it  cannot  be  praised. 

The  convenience  of  this  grouping  of  build- 
ings about  a  courtyard  was  demonstrated  to 
me  one  day  while  calling  on  a  mademoiselle. 
She  and  I  were  endeavoring  to  establish  a 
line  of  communication  with  the  aid  of  a 
French  grammar,  when  her  mother  stepped 
into  the  parlor  and  announced  that  it  was 
time  to  milk  the  cow.  The  girl  took  a  bucket 
from  a  hook,  opened  a  door,  and  there  we 
were  looking  right  into  the  stable  where  the 
cow  stood  placidly  chewing  its  cud.  When 
she  had  finished  milking  we  returned  to  the 
parlor  and  resumed  our  efforts  to  understand 
each  other.  In  consequence  of  this  courtyard 
arrangement  the  houses  in  the  village  were 
constantly  filled  with  whiffs  from  the  cow  bam, 
horse  stable,  the  piggery  and  the  hen  yard. 

In  that  village  horses,  cows,  pigs,  hens  and 
geese  were  privileged  individuals,  for  they 
roamed  the  streets  and  alleys  at  will. 


58      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

The  shopkeepers  evidently  didn't  beheve 
in  advertising,  for  they  had  no  signs  over  their 
places  of  business.  When  I  first  hit  the 
village  I  had  a  hard  time  deciding  which  was 
a  store  and  which  was  a  dwelling. 

We  were  never  at  loss  for  ways  to  amuse 
ourselves.  In  good  weather  we  played  base- 
ball or  duck-on-a-rock  in  a  field  back  of  the 
barracks,  and  when  it  rained  we'd  get  under 
shelter  and  shoot  craps  or  play  cards. 

After  supper  we  could  do  as  we  pleased; 
sometimes  we  would  call  on  a  mademoiselle, 
or  if  things  lagged  we  would  drift  into  the 
Y.  M.  C.  A.  hut,  where  they  had  games  of 
all  sorts,  a  talking  machine  and  writing 
materials.  Those  Y.  M.  C.  A.  huts  are 
certainly  a  godsend  to  the  boys  over  across. 
They  are  doing  wonders  in  the  way  of  boost- 
ing the  morale  of  the  army. 

Sometimes  on  Sundays  we  would  procure 
passes  and  go  to  a  nearby  city.  At  first  we 
had  some  amusing  experiences  on  these  trips 
because  of  our  ignorance  of  the  language. 

On  one  occasion  I  became  lost  because  I 


OVER  THE  HURDLES  59 

didn't  know  enough  French  to  find  my  way 
back  to  camp.  I  guess  I  would  be  still  wan- 
dering about  the  countryside  if  I  hadn't 
encountered  a  French  sergeant  who  knew 
English  very  well. 

Soon  after  we  were  billeted  in  the  village 
we  received  three  months'  pay  all  in  a  lump, 
and  maybe  we  didn't  make  things  hum  for  a 
while.  Wine  was  very  cheap  in  that  part  of 
the  country,  and  at  first  many  of  us  drank 
more  than  was  good  for  us.  It  was  a  very 
sweet  wine  and  didn't  at  all  agree  with  the 
American  brand  of  digestive  organs.  Most  of 
us  became  sensible  and  knocked  off  on  it  all 
together.  We  quickly  realized  that  if  we 
wanted  to  retain  our  pep  we  must  be 
temperate. 

On  October  19,  1917,  a  jolt  of  joy  was 
thrown  into  our  outfit  when  the  orders  came 
to  proceed  with  speed  to  the  front-line 
trenches. 

At  last  we  were  going  into  action  and  start 
things  going  for  Uncle  Sam. 


CHAPTER  VI 

Off  to  the  Front 

EVERY  one  of  us  bristled  with  the 
electricity  of  excitement  as  prepara- 
tions were  speeded  for  the  departure 
to  the  front. 

Every  man  in  the  outfit  was  tickled  to 
death.  We  were  going  to  get  a  chance  to 
show  how  Yankee  gunners  could  fight. 

"We'll  make  the  Kaiser's  eyes  pop  when 
we  start  tossing  shrapnel  over  the  plate,"  a 
tough  little  gunner  said  to  me  in  high  glee. 

"Righto,"  I  grinned,  every  whit  as  pleased 
as  he  was. 

We  made  a  night  hike  of  twenty-two  miles 
with  horses,  guns  and  caissons.  It  was  a 
chilly  march,  and  there  were  oceans  of  mud 
in  which  the  caissons  wallowed  to  the  hub. 
But  we  pushed  and  tugged,  and  kept  the 
line  winding  forward  through  sleepy  villages 
and  over  open   country.      Only  the  horses 

(60) 


OFF  TO  THE  FRONT  61 

minded  the  march,  and  they  wouldn't  have 
minded  could  they  have  understood,  we  were 
sure  of  that. 

We  were  blithe  as  larks,  though  every 
little  while  we  would  have  to  jump  from 
horses  or  gun  carriages  and  help  a  stalled 
wheel.  So  hilariously  happy  were  we  that 
we  were  advancing  toward  Boche-land,  that 
we  were  almost  unconscious  of  the  mud 
and  cold.  A  hundred  times  did  we  make  the 
countryside  echo  with  our  battle  hymn. 

"The  artillery,  the  artillery,  with  dirt  behind  our  ears. 
The  artillery,  the  artillery,  they  can't  get  any  beer. 
The  cavalry,  the  infantry  and  the  bloody  engineers. 
Why,  they  couldn't  lick  the  artillery  in  a  hundred 
thousand  years." 

Every  mile  we  advanced  our  spirits  climbed 
higher  and  so  did  our  appetites.  In  the  mid- 
dle of  the  hike  we  stopped  for  chow,  which 
was  served  from  a  rolling  kitchen.  Beans, 
bacon,  rice,  bread  and  coffee  was  the  menu, 
and  we  devoured  the  rations  like  a  pack  of 
hungry  wolves. 

We  were  soon  on  our  way  again,  singing 


62      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

with  such  ardor  that  villagers  poked  their 
heads  out  of  windows  and  doors  to  see  what 
it  was  all  about.  They  cheered  and  shouted 
encouragement  in  their  native  tongue  when 
they  learned  that  we  were  the  first  American 
artillery  to  start  for  the  front. 

An  old  woman  whose  husband  and  five 
sons  had  given  their  lives  to  France  came 
forth  from  her  little  cottage,  and  offered  the 
fervent  prayer  that  we  would  smite  the  Huns 
hard  when  we  reached  the  front. 

The  picture  of  her  as  she  stood  under  a 
flickering  street  lamp  is  still  vivid  in  my  mem- 
ory. She  raised  her  wrinkled  hands  heaven- 
ward and  poured  forth  invective  against  the 
Germans.  Curse  after  curse  this  mother  of 
France  called  down  upon  the  Kaiser  and  his 
wicked  gang. 

The  old  woman  smiled  a  happy  smile  and 
clasped  her  hands  thankfully  when  we  prom- 
ised her  we  would  leave  no  stone  unturned 
in  the  effort  to  avenge  the  death  of  her  hus- 
band and  sons. 

"God    bless   you   Americans,"    she   cried. 


OFF  TO  THE  FRONT  68 

"The  Almighty  sent  you  over  here  to  save 
France  from  those  devils,  the  Huns." 

Swiftly  we  picked  up  hate  for  the  Hun  on 
that  memorable  hike. 

In  a  village  five  miles  further  on  we  paused 
for  a  few  minutes  to  rest.  Here  a  woman 
approached  us  with  a  boy  about  six  years 
old. 

"You  are  Americans,"  she  said  with  blazing 
eyes,  "and  I  want  to  give  you  inspiration  to 

fight." 

She  bent  over  and  lifted  up  the  arms  of  the 
boy  by  her  side. 

"Look,"  she  said  in  a  cold,  even  voice, 
"this  is  what  the  Boches  did  to  my  little  son." 

We  hardened  artillerymen  gurgled  with 
horror  at  what  we  saw. 

My  God!  The  little  lad's  hands  had  been 
chopped  off  at  the  wrist.  I  had  heard  of  such 
cases,  but  had  never  really  credited  them,  but 
here  was  one  right  before  my  very  eyes. 

A  murmur  of  rage  went  up  from  the  Yanks 
grouped  about. 

"  Those  beasts ! "  growled  a  gunner.    "  We'll 


64     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

send  those  devils  back  to  hell,  where  they 
belong." 

Other  Yanks  expressed  their  shocked  feel- 
ings in  a  manner  quite  as  vitriolic. 

"The  Boches,"  said  the  mother  with  a  face 
full  of  tragedy,  "crippled  my  boy  so  that  he 
could  never  take  up  arms  against  Germany. 
That  is  how  they  are  fighting  France — they 
are  making  war  against  children  as  well  as 
men.  They  stole  my  fifteen-year-old  daugh- 
ter, and  I  have  no  knowledge  of  her  fate.  It 
would  make  me  happy  if  I  knew  she  was 
dead." 

We  all  swore  then  and  there  that  we  would 
make  the  Boches  pay,  and,  thank  God,  we 
made  good  our  promise  before  we  left  France. 

For  many  a  long  mile  after  we  dropped 
that  little  village  we  were  sobered  by  the 
thought  of  the  boy  with  his  hands  lopped  off 
at  the  wrist.  The  sight  of  the  lad  forced 
upon  me  the  knowledge  that  America  was 
indeed  in  the  war  for  the  cause  of  humanity 
and  that  the  world  would  not  be  safe  until 
we  had  whipped  the  Germans  to  their  knees. 


OFF  TO  THE  FRONT  65 

We  arrived  at  a  poky  little  village  through 
which  ran  a  railroad.  Our  hike  was  over, 
and  we  were  not  sorry,  for  we  were  a  little 
weary.' 

We  boarded  box  cars  just  like  the  Uttle 
ones  which  had  taken  us  into  the  interior 
shortly  after  our  arrival  in  France.  When 
the  horses,  guns,  caissons  and  other  equip- 
ment had  been  loaded  aboard,  the  engine 
gave  an  asthmatic  little  toot  and  oflF  we 
started. 

It  was  a  smelly,  itchy,  jolty  trip  all  the  way 
through.  When  the  train  bumped  over  a 
bum  switch,  as  it  often  did,  or  when  you 
managed  to  squeeze  your  head  through  the 
flock  of  heads  at  one  of  the  side  doors  of 
these  box  car  Pullmans,  you  could  feel  and 
see  that  you  were  moving — somewhere. 

I  have  said  that  it  was  an  itchy  trip.  It 
was.  I  started  to  scratch  good  at  about 
dawn,  and  I  noticed  that  others  were  doing  the 
same  thing. 

"I  wonder  what  makes  me  itch  so?"  I 
said  to  a  fellow  gunner. 


66     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"I'll  be  blamed  if  I  know,"  he  replied, 
trying  to  reach  an  isolated  area  on  his  back. 
"I've  got  the  same  thing.  I  believe  it's 
prickly  heat." 

"Prickly  heat  nothing,"  I  said;  "you 
don't  get  prickly  heat  this  kind  of  weather." 

A  little  later  we  discovered  the  cause  of 
the  itch;  we  had  taken  on  a  crop  of  the 
regulation  war  lice  which  the  French  call 
"cooties."     We  were  in  the  war  at  last. 

The  town  of  Nancy  was  our  destination, 
and  we  arrived  there  October  20,  1917. 

iWe  received  our  first  real  taste  of  war  as  we 
pulled  into  that  town. 

The  place  was  in  the  process  of  being 
bombarded  by  a  flock  of  Boche  airmen.  The 
enemy  raiders  were  dropping  tons  of  bombs, 
and  the  place  was  rocking  and  trembling 
from  the  explosions.  Every  time  a  bomb 
landed,  a  great  crater  was  opened  in  a  street, 
or  some  building  crumbled.  Between  the 
big  explosions  we  could  hear  the  popping  of 
French  anti-aircraft  guns.  We  could  see  the 
shrapnel  from  these  guns  burst  around  the 


OFF  TO  THE  FRONT  67 

raiders.  One  of  the  enemy  planes  was  hit 
and  it  came  hurtHng  downward  like  a  comet, 
leaving  a  trail  of  smoke  and  flame. 

French  fliers  mounted  to  meet  the  enemy, 
and  there  followed  a  thrilling  aerial  combat 
over  the  city.  The  daring  of  those  French 
airmen  was  amazing.  They  drove  straight 
at  the  foe,  pouring  a  stream  of  machine-gun 
bullets  at  the  Boches.  I  saw  a  French 
machine  make  a  thrilling  nose  dive  and  take 
up  a  position  in  the  rear  of  a  German  plane, 
sending  drum  after  drum  of  nickel  bullets 
into  the  enemy.  The  Boche  went  wobbly 
under  the  galling  fire,  turned  a  fearful  somer- 
sault and  shot  straight  down  to  earth  like  a 
wounded  bird.  The  noise  was  terrific  and 
death  lurked  everywhere,  but  we  were  glad 
to  bej[  there.  It  was  the  first  time  we  had 
been  under  fire,  but  there  wasn't  a  nervous 
Yank  in  the  outfit. 

While  the  raid  was  going  on  we  were  unload- 
ing our  equipment  as  fast  as  possible.  The 
raiders  quickly  got  a  line  on  us,  for  two 
Boche  machines  darted  in  our  direction  and 


68     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

hovered  over  us.  Things  became  tense  for 
us,  I  can  tell  you,  when  a  great  bomb  shot 
downward  from  one  of  the  machines.  There 
was  every  indication  that  it  would  land  in  the 
midst  of  our  outfit. 


CHAPTER  VII 

The  First  Shot  for  Liberty 

FATE  was  kind  to  us,  for  the  bomb  hit 
about  fifty  yards  in  our  rear,  and 
exploded  with  a  terrible  racket,  spraying 
us  with  gravel. 

Not  one  of  us  received  the  slightest  hurt, 
though  a  few  were  stunned  by  the  concussion. 
That  bomb  opened  up  a  big  enough  hole  to 
use  for  the  basement  of  a  twenty-story 
building. 

We  whipped  up  our  horses  and  dashed 
forward.  Several  French  planes  darted  to 
our  rescue  and  quickly  chased  the  Boche 
a,irmen  out  of  our  bailiwick.  We  yelled  out 
satisfaction  when  we  saw  one  of  the  German 
planes  go  wobbling  back  behind  the  Boche 
lines.  Before  we  reached  the  outskirts  of 
Nancy,  the  French  had  cleared  the  skies  of 
German  fighting  planes.  Ever  since  I  saw 
that  air  battle,  which  was  my  first,  I  have 

(69) 


70     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

entertained  a  mighty  respect  for  the  courage 
of  the  French  fliers.  They  don't  know  what 
fear  is,  and  they  take  all  kinds  of  chances. 

We  pulled  into  camp  at  seven  o'clock  that 
night,  a  fagged-out  bunch  of  Yanks.  We 
knew  we  were  very  close  to  the  front  line, 
for  the  earth  rocked  continuously  from  heavy 
artillery  fire.  We  groomed  our  horses  and 
had  chow  at  about  nine  o'clock.  The  camp 
was  a  filthy  place.  We  laid  down  that  night 
on  six  inches  of  straw  which  was  inhabited 
by  three  or  four  generations  of  cooties.  When 
we  woke  up  the  next  morning  we  found  that 
the  lice  had  taken  possession  of  us  body  and 
soul.  We  sat  in  the  sun  and  hunted  through 
our  undershirts  for  the  pests,  but  it  was  a 
hopeless  job.  While  you  were  killing  one, 
fifty  were  born.  Eventually  we  succumbed 
to  the  odds,  and  gave  it  up. 

That  morning  we  moved  up  to  the  front 
with  a  light  pack,  consisting  of  one  suit  of 
imderwear,  three  pairs  of  socks  and  three 
blankets. 

We  were  billeted  in  a  village  about  a  mile 


THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY    71 

and  a  half  behind  the  first  line.  About  every 
twenty  minutes  the  Germans  would  rake  the 
main  street  of  this  village  with  machine  guns, 
and  twice  a  day  they  would  shell  the  place. 

Under  these  conditions  you  can  well 
imagine  that  the  main  street  was  a  main 
thoroughfare  in  name  only.  Nobody  used 
it  for  walking  purposes  unless  they  had  to. 
When  we  first  went  into  the  village  we  were 
so  reckless  about  walking  in  the  street  that 
the  oflBcers  were  obliged  to  caution  us  con- 
tinually. I  sneered  at  the  danger  on  the 
first  day,  and  told  everybody  I  was  going  to 
cross  that  street,  machine  guns  or  no  machine 
guns.  I  got  over  all  right,  but  when  I  started 
back,  hell  broke  loose.  The  Germans  turned 
a  storm  of  nickel  bullets  down  the  thorough- 
fare, and  I  lost  no  time  in  flattening  myself 
against  the  pavement  until  the  hail  of  death 
had  ceased.  After  that,  when  I  wanted  to 
cross  the  street,  I  went  over  on  my  hands  and 
knees  so  that  the  enemy  gunners  couldn't 
get  a  line  on  me. 

The  Huns  made  a  practice  of  shelling  the 


72      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

town  at  about  noon  and  at  nightfall.  We 
could  almost  tell  to  the  minute  when  the 
methodical  Boches  would  start  hell  going, 
and  we  arranged  our  chow  hours  so  that  the 
shelling  would  not  interfere  with  our 
digestions.  Most  of  the  buildings  in  the 
town  had  been  reduced  to  mere  shells,  but 
the  Germans  kept  peppering  at  them  as  if  it 
was  their  desire  to  knock  down  the  last  brick. 

There  were  about  twenty-five  inhabitants 
left  in  the  town,  and  most  of  them  were  old; 
most  of  them  lived  in  the  cellars  of  shell- 
battered  homesteads.  An  old  woman  there 
had  lost  three  sons  in  the  war;  she  still 
retained  a  cow,  a  pig  and  several  hens.  When 
the  Huns  tossed  over  shells  she  philosophically 
retired  to  her  cellar  and  remained  there  until 
the  death-shower  was  over. 

Of  course,  as  you  can  imagine,  each  of  the 
batteries  of  our  regiment  coveted  the  honor  of 
firing  the  first  gun  for  Uncle  Sam.  We  made 
up  our  minds  that  our  battery,  and  no  other, 
would  do  the  trick. 

But  we  got  a  bad  shock  on  the  night  of 


THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY     73 

October  22d  when  information  reached  us 
that  another  battery  was  out  to  steal  the 
bacon.  We  howled  with  rage  and  appre- 
hension when  we  got  the  news. 

"Are  we  going  to  let  them  get  away  with 
it.^"  cried  a  gunner. 

"We'd  be  a  sick  lot  of  hounds,  if  we  did," 
I  said. 

Our  battery  commander  was  terribly 
aroused,  for  he  had  set  his  heart  on  that 
first  shot.  But  it  was  a  bad  night  for  any 
kind  of  an  operation.  Rain  fell  with  tropical 
violence,  and  mud  lay  everywhere,  a  foot  or 
more  in  depth. 

"If  you  lads  have  the  guts,"  said  our 
commander,  "we'll  fire  that  first  shot.  Who 
will  volunteer  to  pull  the  gun  into  position  by 
hand.?^" 

Every  man-jack  in  the  battery  volunteered 
with  a  whoop. 

It  was  a  job  that  would  have  taxed  the 
utmost  strength  and  courage  of  any  body  of 
men.  Before  the  gun  could  be  placed  in 
position  to  fire  the  first  shot,  we  must  drag 


74     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

it  through  the  storm  and  pitchy  darkness, 
for  a  distance  of  three-quarters  of  a  mile 
over  an  almost  impassable  country — a  swamp, 
pocked  with  mud-choked  shell  holes. 

But  we  huskies  were  fired  by  the  fiercest 
kind  of  enthusiasm,  and  the  thought  that 
another  battery  was  planning  to  cut  in  ahead 
of  us  was  just  the  incentive  we  needed.  So 
we  bent  to  our  task  with  a  will 

Though  the  night  was  black  as  ink,  we  were 
not  allowed  lanterns  to  light  our  way  over 
the  quagmire.  The  flash  of  a  light  would 
have  immediately  drawn  fire  from  the  bat- 
teries of  the  enemy. 

So  we  stumbled  along  through  the  rain 
and  muck,  perspiring  and  cursing  at  our  job, 
but  not  relaxing  one  iota  in  our  determination 
to  land  the  gun  in  a  place  where  we  could 
pot  the  Hun. 

I  was  filled  with  a  kind  of  fierce  exhilaration, 
as  I  tugged  and  pulled  until  I  thought  my 
arms  would  jump  from  their  sockets.  If  we 
landed  the  gun  into  position  I  knew  I  would 
be  the  one  to  fire  it,  and  the  very  thought  of 


THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY     75 

sending  the  first  shot  over  for  Uncle  Sammy 
made  my  noodle  swim  with  joy.  Drenched 
with  muck  and  rain,  as  I  was,  I  could  hardly 
refrain  from  giving  whoop  after  whoop  of 
happiness. 

Once  I  stumbled  and  plunged  into  a  shell 
hole  filled  to  the  brim  with  soft,  slimy  mud, 
worse  than  quicksand.  I  sank  to  my  arm- 
pits, and  would  have  undoubtedly  slipped  in 
over  my  head,  had  not  a  comrade  grabbed 
me  by  the  hair  and  pulled  me  to  safety. 

A  little  later,  another  man  sank  into  one  of 
these  death  traps,  and  we  had  to  feel  around 
quite  a  bit  in  the  darkness  before  we  located 
him.  He  was  actually  gurgling  with  the 
mud  to  his  lips  when  we  yanked  him  out. 
Several  times  the  gun  narrowly  escaped 
dropping  into  one  of  the  craters,  and  if  it  had, 
the  jig  would  have  been  up  for  that  night, 
and  probably  I  would  have  never  fired  the 
first  gun. 

Brush  and  stumps  of  trees  impeded  our 
progress.  Frequently  we  would  fall  over 
these  obstructions,  and  would  curse  in  regu- 


76      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

lation  United  States  while  we  picked  ourselves 
up  and  felt  for  the  gun  ropes  again.  We 
barked  our  chins,  tore  our  uniforms  and  lost 
our  tempers,  but  our  determination  remained 
as  iron-clad. 

I  felt  that  I  would  rather  die  than  fail  in 
the  attempt  to  place  that  little  "75"  in  posi- 
tion. 

Thoughts  of  the  ambition  of  the  rival 
battery  spurred  all  of  us  to  give  the  best 
in  us. 

"Going  to  beat  us  to  it,  are  they.^"  growled 
an  artilleryman  who  had  barked  his  shins 
against  obstructions  until  they  bled.  "Well, 
they  have  a  fat  chance  with  this  bunch  of 
huskies  on  the  job." 

"If  we  don't  fire  the  first  shot,  then  nobody 
will,"  said  another  buddy,  pufiing  at  the 
gun  ropes. 

Our  hands  were  raw  from  pulling  at  the 
rough  ropes  and  the  cold  rain  had  chilled  us 
to  the  bone.  A  round  of  cigarettes  would 
have  helped  a  lot,  but  the  commander  had 
issued  a  rigid  order  against  smoking. 


THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY     77 

We  began  to  take  hope  when  we  reached  the 
foot  of  a  Httle  hill. 

Our  objective  was  the  crest  of  that  hill, 
and  with  a  mighty  spurt  we  rushed  the  gun 
to  the  top. 

Then  we  flopped  in  an  utter  stage  of 
exhaustion.  I  fell  on  my  back  and  lay  there 
panting  like  a  fagged-out  purp.  Every  bone 
and  muscle  in  my  body  howled  with  weariness, 
but  I  was  happy — terribly  happy — ^for  I  felt 
that  I  was  near  the  crowning  event  of  my 
career  as  a  soldier  of  Uncle  Sam,  the  firing 
of  the  first  gun  in  the  war  for  the  United 
States.  It  had  taken  us  four  hours  to  pull 
that  gun  over  the  marsh. 

In  a  pouring  rain,  six  of  us  slept  alongside 
of  the  gun  which  was  shortly  to  make  history 
for  the  world. 

We  were  up  at  five  o'clock,  looking  eagerly 
toward  the  enemy's  country.  It  was  still 
rainy  and  misty,  and  we  could  not  see  more 
than  three  hundred  yards  away.  We  carried 
a  few  rounds  of  ammunition  over  to  our 
position  and  awaited  developments. 


78      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

Captain  I.  R.  McLendon  came  up  at  six 
o'clock.  He  was  accompanied  by  a  French 
colonel  who  had  the  firing  data. 

"Battery,  attention!"  called  the  battery 
commander  in  a  cool,  even  voice. 

The  momentous  event  was  close  at  hand — 
the  official  opening  of  the  war  for  Uncle  Sam 
against  Germany. 

I  thrilled  from  head  to  toe,  but  my  head 
was  cool  and  my  hand  steady. 

The  gun  was  wheeled  into  position,  its 
business  end  pointing  toward  Germany. 
There  was  barely  enough  light  for  us  to  read 
the  markings  on  the  little  piece. 

The  battery  commander  gave  the  word  to 
the  sergeant  and  the  sights  were  set. 

"Use  second  pieces  only,"  rapped  out  the 
commander. 

A  gunner  cut  the  fuse  of  a  shrapnel  to 
meet  the  requirements  of  the  order,  and  the 
shell  was  placed  in  the  breech  of  the  little  "75" 
by  a  non-commissioned  officer. 

"Range  5,500  yards,"  snapped  the  com- 
mander. 


»      •    >» 


W'  )^<l'A\ 


*N^ 


THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY     79 

I  set  the  deflection  and  saw  that  the  cross- 
hair was  on  the  target. 

I  was  tingling  from  head  to  foot  with  the 
tensity  of  the  moment. 

There  was  a  brief  pause,  during  which 
every  mother's  son  of  us  were  on  our  toes. 

"Fire!"  rasped  out  the  commander. 

Filled  with  a  thousand  conflicting  emotions, 
I  pulled  the  lanyard  of  the  little  spitfire,  and 
America's  first  shot  of  the  war  went  screaming 
into  German  territory. 


CHAPTER  Vm 

The  Infantry  in  Action 

THE  savage  departure  of  that  pro- 
jectile for  the  German  lines  was  as 
sweet  music  to  our  ears. 

It  was  a  shrieking  battle-hymn  without 
words. 

The  warning  scream  of  that  eighteen  pounds 
of  shrapnel  served  formal  notice  on  the 
Kaiser  that  the  United  States  had  started 
in  on  the  job  of  exacting  retribution  for  the 
sinking  of  the  "Lusitania,"  the  rape  of 
Belgium,  and  a  thousand  other  outrages 
committed  against  civilization  by  Germany 
since  she  set  out  to  rule  the  world  by  the 
sword. 

There  was  not  an  American  within  sound- 
range  who  did  not  whoop  with  exultation 
when  the  first  shot  for  liberty  rang  forth. 
It  was  an  event  akin  to  the  ringing  of  the  old 
Liberty  Bell  in  '76,  and  it  wouldn't  have  sur- 

(80) 


THE  INFANTRY  IN  ACTION  81 

prised  me  a  bit  if  that  little  French  "  75"  had 
cracked  from  pure  joy,  just  as  the  beloved 
bell  in  Philadelphia  did  when  it  tolled  forth 
the  song  of  American  liberty.  The  little 
French  gun  really  had  more  excuse  for 
cracking,  for  it  spoke  for  world  liberty,  while 
our  Yankee  bell  pealed  for  just  one  country. 
But  I'll  bet  anything  the  old  bell  in  Phila- 
delphia vibrated  from  pure  delight  and  sym- 
pathy when  that  shot  was  fired. 

As  for  me,  I  got  the  reaction  when  my 
hand  left  the  lanyard.  I  shut  my  eyes  to 
stop  the  dizziness,  but  in  a  minute  I  opened 
them  again  and  tried  to  see  through  the  mist 
into  No  Man's  Land.  I  would  have  given 
a  year's  pay  just  then  to  have  observed  where 
the  shell  struck,  but  I  couldn't  see  through 
the  mist  that  enveloped  the  German  line. 

The  shell  as  it  ricochetted  through  the  fog 
probably  had  no  special  meaning  to  the  Ger- 
mans crouched  in  their  trenches  across  No 
Man's  Land. 

It  was  just  one  blast  in  a  chorus  of  blasts, 
for  French  guns  were  barking  away  at  the 


82      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

Huns  all  along  the  line.  If  the  Boches  had 
grasped  the  significance  of  the  shot  they 
would  probably  have  been  a  glum  lot  of 
creatures,  and  undoubtedly  their  beer  would 
have  gone  bitter  in  their  mouths. 

I  want  all  loyal  Americans  to  paste  it  in 
their  hats  that  it  was  C  Battery,  Sixth 
United  States  Field  Artillery,  that  fired  that 
shot,  and  that  every  member  of  the  battery 
did  their  bit  toward  sending  Uncle  Sam's  first 
calling  card  into  the  trenches  of  the  Kaiser. 

We  sent  a  few  more  shells  over  to  help 
Fritz  warm  up  his  morning  coffee,  and  then 
we  were  relieved  and  returned  to  our  quar- 
ters in  the  village  for  chow. 

After  chow,  shovels  were  issued  to  us  and 
we  began  the  arduous  work  of  digging  gun 
pits  and  building  dugouts.  We  constructed 
the  pits  by  digging  in  to  a  depth  of  three 
feet,  and  then  placing  logs,  concrete  slabs 
and  sandbags  around  the  edges  of  the  excava- 
tion. We  camouflaged  our  new  positions  by 
stretching  wire  netting  over  them,  and  cover- 
ing the  netting  with  marsh  grass. 


THE  INFANTRY  IN  ACTION  83 

The  Huns  shelled  us  repeatedly  while  we 
were  at  work,  but  all  the  boys  stood  up  under 
the  music  like  veterans.  We  thought  the 
Boehes  were  getting  our  range  when  they 
landed  a  six-inch  shell  within  thirty  yards 
of  our  position,  but  that  was  the  nearest  they 
came  to  us  that  day. 

That  night  the  American  infantry,  helmeted 
and  ready  for  battle,  marched  into  our  front- 
line trenches.  The  infantry  beat  us  to 
France  by  nearly  two  months,  but  we  of  the 
artillery  got  into  action  more  than  twelve 
hours  ahead  of  the  doughboys. 

After  two  weeks  of  work  on  our  battery 
positions  behind  the  front  line,  our  regiment 
of  artillery  went  into  winter  quarters,  and 
we  were  kept  out  of  the  scrap  until  January, 
when  we  went  in  again  with  a  wallop. 

Our  battery  was  paid  special  honors  all 
along  that  hike  to  winter  quarters. 

The  little  gun  that  fired  the  first  shot  for 
world-liberty  was  decked  with  fresh  flowers 
in  every  village,  and  we  of  C  Battery  had  to 
run  a  kissing  gauntlet  almost  every  step  of 


84     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

the  way.  I  can  tell  you  the  French  appre- 
ciated the  significance  of  that  first  shot. 
They  knew  that  it  spelled  freedom  for  them 
from  the  invading  Hun. 

Sergeant  Hugh  Marsh,  of  Belleville,  Illi- 
nois, who  was  with  the  first  contingent  of 
General  Pershing's  forces  to  reach  France, 
has  given  me  a  graphic  description  of  the 
experiences  of  the  infantry  during  the  period 
I  was  absent  at  winter  quarters,  and  I  shall 
tell  it  as  nearly  as  possible  in  his  own  words. 
After  that  I  will  resume  my  own  story,  and 
take  the  reader  back  again  to  the  Yankee 
battery  positions  behind  the  lines. 

Sergeant  Marsh  spent  four  years  on  the 
Mexican  border  doing  patrol  work  before  he 
went  across  with  the  first  contingent  of  the 
Pershing  forces. 

The  infantry  moved  right  into  the  fight 
zone  upon  their  arrival  in  France,  and  started 
drilling  eight  hours  a  day  under  the  guidance 
of  the  famous  Alpine  Chasseurs,  or  "Blue 
Devils"  as  they  are  called  by  the  Huns. 
They  taught  the  Americans  the  latest  wrinkles 


THE  INFANTRY  IN  ACTION  85 

in  bayoneting,  grenade  throw'ng  and  the  use 
of  the  trench  knife. 

On  the  first  day  of  training  the  boys  drew 
their  full  trench  equipment,  which  included 
packs,  gas  masks,  helmets,  trench  knives  and 
grenade  aprons.  The  latter  look  exactly 
like  a  carpenter's  apron  with  pockets,  but 
in  this  case  the  pockets  are  used  to  hold  the 
deadly  grenades  and  not  tools. 

Of  course  our  lads  were  pretty  green  when 
they  started  training  for  trench  warfare, 
although  most  of  them  were  seasoned  United 
States  soldiers,  and  were  well  up  in  the  sort 
of  fighting  game  which  prevailed  before  the 
Hun  inaugurated  the  most  inhuman  struggle 
in  history.  But  the  Yankee  infantrymen  were 
apt  pupils,  and  in  a  few  weeks  they  out- 
classed their  instructors  in  the  use  of  the 
bayonet  and  grenade. 

The  infantrymen  managed  to  have  a  pretty 
good  time  while  they  were  training.  They 
had  Wednesday  and  Saturday  afternoons  oflF, 
and  on  these  occasions  they  would  go  fishing 
or  promenading  with  some  pretty  mademoi- 


86      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

selle.  When  an  American  soldier  is  struggling 
with  his  French  he  endeavors  first  to  learn 
how  to  ask  for  something  to  eat,  and  second 
how  to  frame  an  invitation  for  a  mademoiselle 
to  promenade  with  him. 

The.  boys  found  excellent  trout  fishing  in 
the  canals  near  their  camp,  but  the  fish 
didn't  bite  fast  enough  for  the  Americans,  so 
they  threw  grenades  into  the  water.  The 
explosions  that  followed  brought  the  fish 
stunned  to  the  surface,  where  they  were 
easily  gathered  by  the  doughboys  by  the 
basket.  By  employing  the  grenade  method, 
the  lads  had  fresh  fish  at  nearly  every  meal 
until  the  French  police  stepped  in  and  put  a 
stop  to  the  practice. 

A  doughboy  considered  himself  lucky  when 
he  was  picked  to  go  on  wood-cutting  detail, 
for  he  could  take  his  gun  along  and  have  a 
shot  at  game.  The  woods  near  the  camp 
abounded  with  wild  boar,  rabbits,  pigeons 
and  geese. 

One  afternoon  a  wood-cutting  detail  in 
charge  of  Sergeant  Marsh  was  charged  by  a 


THE  INFANTRY  IN  ACTION  87 

wild  boar,  and  all  members  of  the  detail 
climbed  to  the  tree  tops  in  a  hurry.  The 
boar  kept  them  treed  there  all  night,  and  the 
next  day  a  squad  was  sent  in  search  of  the 
missing  soldiers.  The  boar  charged  the 
squad,  and  these  soldiers  were  also  obliged 
to  adjourn  to  the  branches.  Finally  one  of 
the  new  arrivals  killed  the  animal  with  a 
well-directed  shot  behind  the  ear. 

The  infantrymen  had  daily  reminders  that 
they  were  right  on  the  edge  of  the  war- 
crater.  The  boom  of  big  guns  reached  their 
ears  constantly,  and  enemy  airplanes  were 
continually  flying  over  the  American  bar- 
racks in  an  effort  to  collect  data  on  the 
strength  of  the  first  detachment  of  General 
Pershing's  forces.  Frequently  the  Huns  ex- 
hibited their  kultur  by  bombing  hospitals 
and  schools.  Every  time  an  enemy  airman 
was  sighted,  bugles  would  be  blown  and  bells 
rung  to  warn  people  to  get  into  their  cellars 
and  other  shelters. 

The  doughboys  were  wild  with  enthusiasm 
when  the  order  came  to  march  to  the  front- 


88     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

line  trenches.  The  business  of  packing  up 
followed.  Bayonets  were  sharpened  with 
gleeful  zeal,  and  fond  farewells  were  exchanged 
with  petite  mademoiselles.  Local  shops  and 
company  stores  were  emptied  of  all  the 
candy  and  other  luxuries  they  contained. 
Kits  were  inspected  with  the  closest  atten- 
tion to  every  detail,  new  uniforms  and  equip- 
ment were  doled  out  liberally,  and  feet  and 
teeth  became  matters  of  keen  curiosity  to 
oflBcers. 

When  everything  was  in  readiness,  the 
Americans  were  packed  into  box  cars  with 
their  equipment,  and  the  first  stage  of  the 
journey  to  the  front  line  was  begun.  As 
they  drew  nearer  to  the  front,  the  Yanks 
saw  everywhere  gruesome  evidence  of  the 
blasting  hand  of  the  Hun.  They  passed 
dozens  of  places  which  had  once  been  the 
sites  of  prosperous,  happy  villages,  but  were 
now  unsightly  heaps  of  brick  and  mortar, 
with  here  and  there  a  ragged  wall  standing. 

A  few  miles  back  of  the  front  line  the 
Americans  left  the  box  cars  and  began  on 


THE  INFANTRY  IN  ACTION  89 

foot  the  last  stage  of  the  journey  to  the 
trenches. 

The  country  grew  more  desolate  as  they 
advanced.  Our  boys  saw  hundreds  of  graves 
marked  by  little  wooden  crosses,  and  there 
were  old,  ruined  dugouts  and  trenches  which 
the  French  had  taken  from  the  Germans. 
There  were  huge  shell  craters,  and  the 
ground  was  scattered  with  rusty  infantry 
equipment.  The  Americans  saw  long  lines 
of  munition  and  supply  trains  creeping  f  oward, 
and  now  the  noise  of  the  big  guns  became 
deafening. 

It  was  dusk  when  the  Yankees  arrived  at 
the  trenches.  Orders  came  to  stop  smoking 
and  talk  only  in  whispers  as  they  entered  a 
communication  trench  to  go  to  the  first  line. 
Silently  and  in  single  file  the  Yanks  pushed 
foward  in  the  winding  traverse  until  they 
reached  the  first-line  trench,  where  they  were 
greeted  enthusiastically  by  the  French  troops 
they  were  to  relieve. 

The  French,  clad  in  their  blue-gray  uni- 
forms and  tin  hats,  kissed  and  hugged  their 


90     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

new  American  allies  after  the  French  custom. 
Before  the  French  filed  away  to  their  rest 
station,  they  assured  the  Americans  that  the 
sector  was  the  quietest  on  the  whole  front 
line.  Because  of  this,  they  said  it  had  been 
called  the  "peace  sector." 

But  I  guess  the  shelling  our  battery  had 
given  the  enemy  in  the  early  morning  had 
changed  his  disposition,  for  bedlam  broke 
loose  soon  after  the  French  departed. 

Maybe  a  spy  had  carried  word  to  the  Ger- 
mans that  Americans  had  taken  over  the 
sector. 

Be  that  as  it  may,  the  Yanks  had  no  rest 
that  night.  The  Huns  rained  shells  on  our 
line  and  one  American  was  killed.  The 
shelling  became  more  violent  when  morning 
dawned  and  the  Boches  saw  the  stars  and 
stripes  fluttering  proudly  to  the  breeze  over 
the  sector.  The  sight  of  that  glorious  banner 
must  have  been  as  gall  to  the  beasts.  It  told 
them  for  sure  that  the  United  States  was  in 
the  fight  for  real. 

Were  our  doughboys  scared  by  their  first 


THE  INFANTRY  IN  ACTION  91 

experience  under  fire?  Not  so  as  you  could 
notice  it.  Their  officers  had  hard  work 
restraining  them  from  going  over  the  top  and 
charging  the  Boches  trenches,  which  of  course 
would  have  been  a  very  foolish  thing  to  do. 
Every  one  of  the  fighters  from  the  States 
were  boiling  to  mix  it  up  with  bayonet, 
trench  knife  and  grenade.  The  Americans 
stood  up  under  fire  like  seasoned  veterans, 
and  kept  a  merry  machine  gun  fusillade  going 
in  answer  to  the  shell  fire. 

It  is  typical  of  the  Yankee  that  he  cannot 
rest  content  until  he  has  paid  off  old  scores, 
and  when  morning  dawned  the  American 
infantrymen  set  out  to  exact  retribution  from 
the  Huns  for  the  one  United  States  soldier 
killed  during  the  night. 

Snipers — the  best  sharpshooters  in  General 
Pershing's  forces — took  positions  in  favorable 
spots  along  the  sector,  and  watched  their 
chances  with  keen  Yankee  eyes.  And  every 
time  the  smallest  part  of  a  Hun's  anatomy 
showed  on  the  other  side,  crack  would  go  an 
American  rifle.     The  bullets  that  sped  over 


92     THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

No  Man's  Land  rarely  missed  their  mark. 
The  snipers  estimated  they  bagged  seven 
Germans  that  day,  which  was  fair  retribu- 
tion for  the  killing  of  one  clean,  honest  God- 
fearing American  soldier. 

But  right  away  the  Boches  employed 
trickery  to  get  even  with  the  Americans.  In 
some  manner  they  smuggled  a  machine  gun- 
ner out  into  No  Man's  Land.  From  his  con- 
cealed position  this  gunner  was  able  to  rake 
a  section  of  the  American  trench  at  will.  Our 
boys  were  obliged  to  duck  into  their  dugouts 
or  lay  flat  on  their  stomachs  in  the  trench  to 
keep  from  getting  killed  or  wounded.  The 
situation  was  desperate,  for  there  is  nothing 
that  so  disturbs  the  morale  of  fighters  as  the 
machinations  of  an  unseen  sniper.  The  way 
in  which  the  Yanks  dealt  with  the  situation 
showed  they  were  more  than  a  match  for  the 
Germans  in  resourcefulness  and  cunning. 


CHAPTER  IX 
Feeling  Out  the  Hun 

THE  problem  at  hand  was  to  wipe  out 
that  machine  gunner  before  he  did 
any  serious  damage. 

But  every  time  our  sharpshooters  plugged 
bullets  into  the  spot  where  they  thought  the 
Boche  gunner  was  stationed,  the  Hun  would 
change  his  position  in  some  mysterious  man- 
ner, and  start  peppering  our  line  from  another 
angle.  Parts  of  the  American  line  became 
untenable. 

Finally  one  day  when  the  Boche  machine 
gun  started  barking  our  men  turned  a  trench 
mortar  loose  on  the  pest.  The  gun  out  in  No 
Man's  Land  suddenly  became  silent  and  gave 
the  Yanks  no  further  trouble.  The  following 
night  an  American  patrol  found  the  Boche 
gunner  dead  in  a  shell  hole  with  his  machine  gun, 
badly  battered,  beside  him.  The  American 
trench  mortar  had  done  its  work  well. 

(9S) 


94      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

From  the  first.  No  Man's  Land,  with  its 
shell  craters  and  barbed  wire  entanglements, 
was  enthusiastically  explored  by  the  Yankees. 
In  fact,  from  the  start  they  virtually  took 
over  the  control  of  this  desolate  region  and 
annexed  it  to  the  United  States.  Every 
night  our  forces  sent  out  patrols  to  ambush 
Boches,  cut  enemy  barbed  wire  and  to  feel 
out  the  positions  of  the  Hun. 

On  his  second  night  in  the  trenches. 
Sergeant  Marsh  went  out  with  an  ambush 
party.  The  members  of  the  party  were 
guided  through  the  barbed  wire  by  a  French 
soldier. 

"When  the  Frenchy  had  taken  us  through 
the  barbed  wire,"  said  the  sergeant,  "his 
mission  was  ended,"  and  he  turned  back 
after  wishing  us  Godspeed  in  our  mission. 
It  was  our  first  trip  into  No  Man's  Land,  and 
I  confess  that  it  was  spooky  work  at  first. 
It  was  as  dark  as  a  pocket  out  there,  and  a 
heavy  rain  was  falling.  Our  mission  was 
to  wait  by  a  certain  water  hole,  in  the  hope  of 
amb  ashing  any  Huns  that  might  come  there 


Over  the  Top 


Trench  Inspection 

Sebgeant  Hugh  Marsh  Illustrates  Life  in  the  Trenches 


FEELING  OUT  THE  HUN  95 

during  the  night  for  water.  We  waited 
there  for  six  hours,  but  no  Germans  came. 
Every  once  in  a  while  the  Huns  would  send 
up  a  flare  from  their  trenches  and  we  would 
flatten  out  on  our  stomachs  and  wait  until 
the  light  died  down.  It  is  a  curious  fact  that 
if  you  remain  perfectly  still  while  a  flare  is 
in  operation  the  enemy  cannot  see  you,  no 
matter  how  brightly  the  landscape  is  illumi- 
nated, but  if  you  move  even  the  slightest 
bit  you  will  be  detected  and  made  the  subject 
of  target  practice  for  machine  guns  and 
rifles. 

The  next  night  Sergeant  Marsh  and  his 
men  made  another  trip  out  in  No  Man's 
Land,  and  inspected  the  enemy's  barbed 
wire.  They  were  searching  for  weak  spots 
when  they  were  detected  by  the  enemy. 
The  Huns  sent  up  star  shells  and  started  a 
brisk  fire  with  machine  guns.  The  Americans 
dropped  flat  on  their  stomachs,  and  when  the 
flares  died,  crawled  to  a  shell  hole,  where  they 
remained  until  the  fire  had  slackened.  Then 
they  crept  back  to  their  trenches. 


96      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

On  another  night  an  Incident  occurred 
which  showed  that  the  Huns  were  constantly 
in  fear  of  being  attacked  and  were  very  much 
worried  over  the  arrival  of  the  Americans. 
On  this  particular  evening  a  Yankee  patrol 
made  a  noise  out  in  No  Man's  Land,  and  the 
Germans  evidently  thought  the  Americans 
had  started  a  general  attack  all  along  the 
line,  for  they  sent  up  scores  of  flares,  and 
dropped  a  barrage  on  our  trenches  which 
lasted  for  fifty  minutes.  It  made  our  dough- 
boys laugh  to  see  the  Germans  waste  their 
ammunition  against  a  phantom  attacking 
force. 

Four  of  our  men  stationed  in  a  listening 
post  showed  their  mettle  when  the  Germans 
dropped  a  trench  mortar  box  barrage  on  a 
communication  trench  and  cut  them  oflf  so 
they  could  not  get  back  to  our  lines. 

Thirty  Germans  raided  the  post  under 
cover  of  the  barrage,  and  a  fierce  hand-to- 
hand  struggle  ensued.  Our  boys  put  up  a 
terrific  fight  and  accounted  for  at  least 
twelve  of  the  Huns  before  they  were  over-; 


FEELING  OUT  THE  HUN  97 

whelmed  and  killed.  The  next  day  our  men 
found  traces  of  the  fearful  struggle.  German 
rifles,  helmets  and  bayonets  were  scattered 
all  about  the  post,  and  one  of  our  men  lay 
dead  with  his  automatic  clutched  in  his  hand. 
All  of  the  cartridges  were  gone,  showing 
that  he  had  not  ceased  to  fire  until  he  was 
struck  down.  This  incident  furnishes  a 
good  example  of  the  average  American  pluck. 
The  Yankees  will  die  fighting  rather  than 
submit  to  be  taken  prisoner. 

When  you  make  a  visit  to  the  German 
trenches  you  can  always  look  for  a  return 
visit.  It  may  occur  the  next  night,  or  maybe 
it  will  not  happen  until  a  couple  of  weeks 
later. 

Raids  are  made  usually  for  the  purpose  of 
taking  prisoners  and  squeezing  information* 
out  of  them  concerning  the  strength  of  the 
enemy  positions.  When  it  is  decided  to  make 
a  raid,  the  officer  in  command  calls  for  vol- 
unteers, and  of  course  everybody  volunteers. 
A  certain  number  of  men  are  selected^ for 
the  stunt,  and  the  preparations  begin.     The 


98      THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

raiders  cover  their  faces  and  bayonets  with 
lampblack,  and  then  steal  into  No  Man's 
Land  with  pistols  and  grenades.  Sometimes 
the  raid  is  a  silent  one;  that  is,  you  suddenly 
rush  forward  without  the  formality  of  a 
barrage,  jump  into  the  Boche  first-line  trench, 
grab  a  couple  of  prisoners  and  get  back  with 
them  before  the  enemy  has  time  to  tumble  to 
the  situation  and  do  you  any  damage. 

The  barrage  raid  is  the  most  thrilling.  The 
time  of  the  starting  of  this  raid  is  called  the 
"zero  hour."  Your  batteries  start  the  bar- 
rage and  you  follow  right  along  after  it  to  the 
Boche  trenches.  It  doesn't  pay  to  walk  too 
fast,  for  if  you  do  you  are  likely  to  get  in  the 
way  of  your  own  barrage  and  be  killed.  When 
you  reach  the  enemy  trenches  your  first  work 
is  to  take  prisoners,  and  then  you  blow  up 
dugouts  and  munition  dumps  with  your 
grenades.  Your  barrage  follows  you  right 
back  to  your  own  trenches,  protecting  you  all 
the  while  from  the  enemy. 

While  our  infantrymen  were  bravely  holding 
their  own  in  the  trenches  frequent  clashes 


FEELING  OUT  THE  HUN  99 

were  occurring  in  the  air  above.  On  clear 
days  air  fighting  and  air  scouting  proceeded 
briskly,  and  every  time  a  flock  of  enemy 
airmen  moved  toward  our  trenches,  our  anti- 
aircraft guns  got  busy  sending  a  barrage  of 
shrapnel  skyward. 

Early  in  November,  1917,  two  German 
planes  flew  over  the  American  lines  for  the 
purpose  of  making  photographs.  The  Yankee 
doughboys  rubbered  upward,  wondering  what 
had  become  of  the  allied  machines. 

They  did  not  wonder  long.  Way  up  in  the 
sky  appeared  a  spot  no  bigger  than  a  d^me. 
It  was  a  French  plane  coming  down  like  a 
rocket  in  a  daring  nose  dive.  It  seemed  to  the 
enthralled  watchers  in  the  trenches  that  this 
man  was  hurtling  to  his  death. 

But  when  the  French  flier  had  dropped 
some  two  thousand  feet  his  plane  suddenly 
righted,  and  he  swung  in  behind  one  of  the 
Boche  photographing  machines  and  opened 
fire  on  it  with  his  machine  gun. 

The  Boche  pilot  flopped  back  in  his  seat, 
his  chest  riddled  with  bullets.     The  machine 


100    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

shot  to  earth,  and  the  Frenchman  followed 
to  make  sure  that  he  had  made  a  killing. 
When  he  had  ascertained  that  the  machine 
and  the  pilot  was  out  of  commission  he 
ascended  again  and  made  after  the  other 
enemy  plane,  but  the  Boche  evidently  had  no 
desire  to  share  the  fate  of  his  countryman,  for 
he  scooted  for  home  in  short  order. 

A  few  days  later,  on  a  bright  morning,  a 
big  double-seater  German  fighting  plane, 
flying  low,  made  directly  for  the  American 
trenches.  There  was  a  pilot  and  a  gunner 
aboard,  and  it  was  apparently  the  intention 
of  the  outfit  to  sweep  our  trenches  with 
machine  gun  bullets  and  bomb  our  dugouts. 
It  was  a  ticklish  situation,  for  none  of  our 
planes  were  in  sight.  But  our  sharpshooters 
were  cool  and  steady  as  they  prepared  to 
give  the  swiftly  approaching  enemy  plane  a 
warm  reception. 


CHAPTER  X 

Clashes  with  the  Enemy 

OUR  sharpshooters  let  go  when  the  big 
German  plane  came  within  easy 
range. 

The  shooting  was  wonderfully  accurate 
and  put  the  finishing  touches  to  the  ambition 
of  the  Boche  aviators  to  bomb  the  American 
position. 

The  German  machine  gunner  was  seen  to 
lurch  heavily  forward  as  if  he  had  been  badly 
hit.  A  bullet  from  a  Yankee  rifle  smashed 
through  the  oil  tank  of  the  plane,  and  other 
bullets  fired  by  our  crack  shots  riddled  the 
wings  of  the  machine.  The  German  pilot 
saw  he  had  struck  a  hornet's  nest,  and  he 
turned  tail  and  hiked  back  to  his  own  lines. 
This  incident  demonstrated  to  the  Huns  that 
in  the  Yankees  they  are  contending  with 
the  crack  sharpshooters  of  the  world. 

In  one  place  our  trenches  were  less  than 

(101) 


102    irgSi  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

sixty  feet  from  those  of  the  Germans,  while 
in  another  place  fully  a  mile  separated  the 
opposing  forces.  Our  trenches  were  located 
in  marshy  ground,  making  the  use  of  "duck 
boards"  necessary  at  all  times  except  when 
the  trench  water  and  mud  became  frozen  in 
winter.  The  trenches  were  very  shallow 
when  our  infantrymen  moved  in,  but  they 
began  immediately  to  deepen  them  and 
improve  them  in  other  ways. 

In  every  dugout  the  soldiers  worked  almost 
constantly  pumping  out  the  water  which 
seeped  in.  The  presence  of  this  water  was 
disagreeable,  of  course,  but  in  one  way  it 
served  a  good  purpose.  Rats  detest  water, 
and  they  gave  these  damp  dugouts  a  wide 
berth,  for  which  our  boys  were  supremely 
grateful. 

Every  man  in  the  line  at  all  times  kept  his 
eyes  peeled  for  two  kinds  of  colored  rockets. 
One  is  green  and  the  other  red.  The  first 
means  asphyxiating  gas,  and  the  other  calls 
for  a  barrage.  And  the  green  light  to  the 
men  in  the  line  means  more  than  anything 


CLASHES  WITH  THE  ENEMY  103 

else,  for  in  a  gas  attack  they  know  that  their 
lives  often  depend  upon  the  speed  in  which 
the  gas  masks  are  adjusted  after  an  alarm  is 
given. 

During  November,  1917,  the  Huns  made 
several  attempts  to  raid  the  American  Hues, 
but  were  always  beaten  back  with  heavy  loss. 
The  Germans  made  an  attack  early  in  the 
night  of  November  12th,  bringing  up  five 
machine  guns  and  opening  a  cross-fire  on  the 
Yankee  lines.  Not  one  of  our  men  were  hit. 
When  the  first  deluge  of  bullets  came,  the 
American  heutenant  in  command  telephoned 
for  the  machine  guns  to  came  up  on  either 
flank  and  fire  toward  the  Germans  in  No 
Man's  Land.  Observers  at  listening  posts 
reported  that  there  were  two  hundred  Boches 
in  the  raiding  party. 

Our  machine  guns  began  peppering  in  less 
than  a  minute  after  the  first  German  shot  was 
fired.  A  few  minutes  later  the  artillery  in  the 
rear  was  laying  down  a  barrage  where  the 
Germans  were  supposed  to  be.  The  Yankees 
in   the   trenches,   shielding  their  faces   with 


104    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

their  steel  helmets,  climbed  on  the  shooting 
ledges,  aiming  at  the  flashes  of  the  German 
machine  guns.  The  attack  was  continued 
for  more  than  a  half  hour  before  the  Germans 
retired.  It  is  believed  that  they  timed  the 
raid  to  take  the  Americans  by  surprise  while  a 
relief  was  entering  the  trenches.  Both  Ameri- 
can and  French  soldiers  in  advanced  listening 
posts  reported  seeing  the  returning  Germans 
carrying  bodies.  This  indicated  they  had 
suffered  heavy  losses. 

In  the  early  morning  of  November  15th, 
the  Huns  attempted  another  raid  and  were 
repulsed.  The  Germans  moved  several 
machine  guns  into  No  Man's  Land  and  swept 
our  communication  trenches  with  a  heavy 
fire  in  preparation  for  an  advance.  At  the 
same  instant  American  flares  disclosed  the 
raiders,  and  the  French  and  Yankee  batteries 
dropped  a  grilling  barrage  in  the  midst  of  the 
foe.  The  Huns  retreated,  suffering  several 
casualties. 

And  all  the  while  the  Yankee  boys  were 
fighting  cooties  as  well  as  Germans.     These 


CLASHES  WITH  THE  ENEMY  105 

little  pests  are  certainly  the  bane  of  the  life 
of  the  soldier.  Sometimes  I  think  that 
eventually  they  will  gobble  up  all  of  the 
German  and  Allied  soldiers  and  fight  this 
war  out  between  themselves. 

When  the  boys  got  leave  from  the  trenches 
the  first  thing  they  did  was  to  go  back  of  the 
lines  and  take  a  gasoline  bath.  This  rid 
them  of  the  lice.  Then  they  would  put  on 
new  underclothing  and  fresh  uniforms,  and 
feel  like  men  again. 

The  American  soldier  on  leave  from  the 
trenches  has  the  time  of  his  life.  His  Uncle 
Sammy  has  seen  to  that.  The  American 
government  has  taken  over  the  famous  water- 
ing place,  Aix-les-Bains  on  the  borders  of  the 
Alps,  and  turned  the  place  into  a  paradise  for 
Yankee  soldiers.  For  fifty  cents  a  day,  the 
American  doughboy  is  allotted  a  room  which 
millionaires  in  ante-bellum  days  were  glad 
to  secure  for  fifty  dollars  a  day.  The 
Y.  M.  C.  A.  and  other  organizations  are 
spending  vast  sums  at  Aix-les-Bains  for  the 
entertainment  of  American  soldiers  on  leave. 


106    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

Sergeant  Marsh  spent  two  months  in  the 
front-line  trenches,  and  then,  one  morning  at 
two  o'clock,  he  was  put  out  of  commission  in 
a  Boche  gas  attack.  He  was  taken  to  a  hos- 
pital and  remained  there  until  he  was  selected 
with  others  of  Pershing's  forces  to  return  to 
America  and  aid  in  the  third  Liberty  Loan 
Campaign. 

I  will  now  resume  the  story  of  my  experi- 
ences with  Battery  C,  Sixth  United  States 
Field  Artillery. 

After  our  battery  had  fired  the  first  gun, 
and  had  spent  two  weeks  improving  the 
position  back  of  the  Yankee  first  line,  we 
groaned  with  disappointment  when  the  order 
came  to  move  to  winter  quarters.  Every 
man- jack  of  us  considered  it  pretty  tough 
to  be  yanked  out  of  the  scrap  just  after  we 
had  poked  our  nose  into  it  and  were  beginning 
to  warm  up.  But  orders  are  orders,  and  of 
course  we  had  to  submit. 

So,  very  sorrowfully,  we  began  a  three  days' 
hike  for  the  winter  billets  many  miles  back  of 
the  line. 


CLASHES  WITH  THE  ENEMY  107 

jrhe  village  which  had  been  wished  on  to  us 
for  winter  quarters  was  far  from  being  a 
spotless  town  or  a  model  community.  If  that 
town  had  been  located  in  America  it  would 
have  had  the  board  of  health  down  on  it  in 
short  order.  And  the  board  of  health  would 
have  had  to  put  in  some  hard  work  to  bring 
the  place  up  to  the  American  standard  of 
sanitation. 

After  we  had  been  in  the  village  five  min- 
utes we  decided  that  we  had  an  important 
duty  to  perform,  and  that  duty  was  to  clean 
the  place  up.  There  were  evidences  that 
we  would  have  to  educate  the  people  before 
we  could  bring  this  about,  but  we  determined 
we  would  do  that  if  it  was  necessary. 

That  little  village  was  strong  on  the  map, 
not  because  of  its  commercial  or  agricultural 
importance,  but  principally  because  of  its 
astonishing  variety  of  odors.  You  could 
smell  that  town  ten  miles  away  if  the  wind 
was  blowing  in  the  right  direction. 

In  front  of  almost  every  house  in  the  village 
was  a  manure  heap,  and  before  he  had  been  in 


108    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

town  an  hour  our  commander  decided  that 
these  heaps  would  have  to  be  removed. 

The  edict  nearly  started  a  revolution  in 
the  village.  The  villagers  seemed  to  regard 
these  manure  heaps  as  heirlooms,  and  I  guess 
some  of  them  were.  The  inhabitants 
appointed  a  committee  to  call  upon  the  com- 
mander and  protest  against  the  removal 
of  the  historic  piles,  but  our  ranking  oflSicer 
was  firm,  and  said  they  must  go.  The  next 
day  we  went  at  the  heaps  with  shovels  and 
carted  the  fertilizer  to  a  place  a  considerable 
distance  from  the  village.  The  village  smelled 
fifty  per  cent  sweeter  after  that,  and  life  was 
less  burdensome. 

We  were  billeted  in  bams — historic  barns, 
I  should  have  said,  for  there  was  every  evi- 
dence that  they  had  been  built  long  before 
the  time  of  the  first  Napoleon.  We  slept  in 
these  barns  along  with  the  horses,  cows,  pigs 
and  chickens,  and  at  night  as  we  lay  in  the 
hay  we  could  look  up  through  holes  in  the 
roof  and  see  the  stars.  Of  course  it  was 
pleasant  to  see  the  stars,  but  it  wasn't  so 


CLASHES  WITH  THE  ENEMY  109 

hunky-dory  when  it  rained  or  snowed  and 
the  wet  sifted  down  through  those  holes  in 
the  roof.  Many  a  time  I  waked  up  in  the 
morning  and  wiped  away  a  miniature  drift  of 
snow  from  my  eyebrows. 

The  floors  of  these  barns  were  so  ancient 
that  they  were  rotten,  and  several  of  the 
boys  fell  through  and  sustained  ugly  bruises. 
In  a  windstorm  the  barn-billets  rocked  like 
boats  at  sea,  and  when  the  weather  was 
frigid  we  had  to  burrow  down  under  the  hay 
with  our  blankets  to  keep  warm.  The  orders 
against  smoking  in  the  billets  were  rigid,  and 
we  were  not  allowed  to  have  lamps  or  candles. 
Some  of  us  had  flashlights,  so  we  were  able  to 
maneuver  around  at  night  without  breaking 
our  necks. 

Waking  up  in  the  morning  in  my  barn- 
billet  was  an  event. 

A  little  red  rooster  served  as  our  alarm  clock. 

This  little  barnyard  pest  would  take  a 
position  on  a  high  rafter  and  start  his  devilish 
little  cock-a-doodle-doo  business  at  about 
four  o'clock  every  morning. 


110    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

My  buddies  would  roll  over  in  the  hay, 
mumbling  curses  at  the  aggravating  little 
fowl.  But  I  guess  the  rooster  thought  he 
was  being  applauded,  for  he  kept  it  up  harder 
than  ever,  giving  us  all  of  the  shrieking 
variations  of  his  cock-a-doodle-doo  morning 
song. 

Then  the  boys  would  reach  for  things  to 
throw  at  their  tormentor.  Shoes,  cans, 
pieces  of  wood  and  everything  within  reach 
would  fly  up  at  the  bird.  On  rare  occasions 
a  missile  would  reach  its  mark,  and  then  the 
bird  would  flutter  down  to  the  barn  floor. 
But  by  this  time  all  of  the  fowl  and  animal 
kingdom  were  awake  and  further  snoozing 
was  an  impossibility* 

Every  barnyard  cock  in  the  neighborhood 
took  up  the  morning  song;  horses  began 
kicking  at  the  sides  of  their  stalls,  cows  mooed 
for  their  grub  and  pigs  grunted  for  breakfast. 

But  we  got  even  with  that  feathered  alarm 
clock,  all  right.  We  laid  in  a  supply  of  rocks 
one  night  in  the  haymow,  and  the  next  morn- 
ing when  the  pest  started  in  his  ear-splitting 


CLASHES  WITH  THE  ENEMY  111 

clack  we  let  him  have  a  hail  of  missiles.  A 
heavy  stone  landed  on  the  music  box  of  the 
fowl,  and  we  had  him  for  dinner  at  noon. 


CHAPTER  XI 

Camp  Life 

BUT  sleeping  in  the  barn-billets  had  one 
advantage;  we  had  fresh  eggs  for 
breakfast. 

During  the  day  those  simpletons  of  hens 
would  lay  their  eggs  in  the  haymow,  and 
every  morning  we  would  go  on  an  egg  hunt. 
The  farmer  who  owned  the  barn  where  we 
were  billeted  complained  all  the  time  because 
he  thought  his  hens  had  stopped  laying. 

"This  war,"  he  said  to  us,  "has  turned 
everything  upside  down;  even  the  hens 
won't  lay  any  more." 

We  washed  our  clothes  in  a  duck  pond 
near  the  village,  and  every  Sunday  was  wash- 
day. The  mademoiselles  in  the  village  used 
to  come  to  the  pond  and  kid  us  while  we  were 
doing  the  washerwoman  stunt.  Sometimes 
they  would  take  pity  on  us  and  help  us  out. 

It  was  a  hard  winter  and  a  cold  one.  Our 
(n«) 


CAMP  LIFE  113 

horses  were  smooth  shod,  and  there  was  the 
devil  to  pay  when  we  took  them  on  artillery- 
maneuvers.  They  slipped  and  fell  on  the 
icy  roads,  and  many  of  them  broke  their  legs 
and  had  to  be  shot.  Sometimes  we  would  be 
absent  three  or  four  days  on  maneuvers, 
sleeping  in  our  blauKets  on  ground  covered 
with  snow.  Several  of  the  artillerymen 
went  to  the  hospital  with  frozen  feet.  Food 
was  scarce,  and  on  an  average  we  had  only 
one  good  meal  a  day. 

Breakfast  was  our  best  meal,  consisting  of 
bacon,  hardtack,  coffee  and  potatoes  with 
the  jackets  on.  At  noon  we  had  a  sandwich 
and  at  night  beef  stew,  coffee  and  hardtack. 
The  food  improved  wonderfully  after  the 
raising  of  the  second  Liberty  Loan  over  in 
America.  The  folks  at  home  must  back  us 
to  their  last  cent  if  we  are  to  win  this  war. 
Money  talks  harder  right  now  over  in  France 
than  at  any  time  in  the  history  of  the  world. 
There  must  be  a  constant  stream  of  cash  from 
the  pockets  of  Americans  if  we  are  to  keep  men 
and  munitions  pouring  into  the  fighting  zone. 


114    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

While  in  winter  quarters  I  had  an  excellent 
opportunity  to  watch  the  training  of  war 
dogs  which  are  now  being  used  extensively 
by  the  French. 

The  faithfulness  of  these  animals  is  taxed 
to  the  utmost  when  they  are  assigned  to 
guard  munitions  and  prisoners,  but  this  they 
do  with  devotion.  Dogs  that  have  been 
trained  to  work  with  the  ambulance  corps 
have  performed  wonderful  work  in  seeking 
and  locating  the  wounded.  There  is  an- 
other class  of  dogs  called  convoys.  They 
are  used  to  pull  small  mitrailleuses  and 
sleighs.  Other  dogs  are  delegated  to  the 
job  of  killing  rats  in  the  trenches,  and  they 
do  it  well. 

All  kinds  of  dogs,  from  the  mongrel  to  the 
animal  with  a  pedigree,  are  used  in  the  service. 
The  breeds  include  St.  Bernards,  Alaskan  dogs, 
Newfoundland  dogs,  collies,  bobtails,  Alsatian 
dogs,  fox  terriers,  Scotch  terriers,  Irish  ter- 
riers. Dandy  Dinmonts,  Aberdeen  terriers, 
English  bulldogs,  and  Skye  terriers. 

All  of  these  dogs  were  given  voluntarily 


CAMP  LIFE  115 

to  the  French  Ministry  of  War  for  the  duration 
of  the  hostilities. 

The  animals  have  to  pass  an  examination 
just  like  soldiers  and  nurses  before  they  are 
sent  to  the  front.  They  are  examined  by  a 
special  board  before  they  are  shipped  to  the 
canine  training  camps. 

After  carefully  inspecting  the  bow-wow 
situation  at  one  of  these  dog-training  camps, 
I  came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  average 
purp  has  the  same  hero-makings  as  a  man. 

Hundreds  of  dogs  engaged  in  courier  work 
and  the  rescue  of  the  wounded  have  already 
given  up  their  lives  in  this  war. 

As  couriers  the  dogs  carry  important  dis- 
patches from  one  military  unit  to  the  other 
over  country  that  is  exposed  to  heavy  shell 
fire.  They  carry  the  messages  more  quickly 
than  a  soldier  can  do  it,  and  a  dog  will  go 
into  places  where  the  average  man  wouldn't 
dare  to  venture. 

I  made  the  acquaintance  of  "Zip,"  an 
English  bulldog  that  carried  a  message  two 
miles  through  a  shell  inferno  at  Verdun.     The 


116    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

dog's  jaw  was  fractured  by  a  shell  fragment, 
but  the  plucky  animal  carried  out  its  mission 
in  spite  of  the  wound.  When  I  saw  "Zip" 
his  jaw  was  in  splints,  and  he  was  on  the  road 
to  recovery  and  active  service  again. 

All  of  the  intelligence  of  the  canine  is 
brought  to  the  fore  in  the  work  of  the  ambu- 
lance dog.  After  the  ambulance  dog  finds  a 
wounded  man  he  brings  in  the  man's  cap  and 
then  leads  the  ambulance  drivers  or  stretcher 
bearers  to  the  spot  in  No  Man's  Land  where 
he  has  discovered  the  fallen  soldier.  Dogs  of 
super-intelligence  have  been  trained  to  attract 
the  attention  of  ambulance  drivers  to  the 
wounded  by  the  means  of  a  series  of  short, 
quick  barks. 

All  of  the  dogs  in  the  service  wear  little 
wallets  around  their  necks.  These  wallets 
contain  flasks  and  rough  dressings  for  first 
aid. 

Kennels  have  been  established  at  the  front 
line  for  the  dogs.  They  are  given  as  good 
care  as  are  the  soldiers  in  the  trenches.  They 
have  sulphur  baths  daily  to  protect  them  from 


CAMP  LIFE  117 

disease,  and  their  chow  consists  of  the  best 
cuts  of  meats. 

One  of  the  dogs  at  the  station  I  visited  had 
rescued  twenty  wounded  men.  He  was  a  big 
Newfoundland,  and  his  name  was  "Napo- 
leon." Part  of  his  tail  had  been  shot  away 
by  a  shell  fragment,  and  once  he  had  been 
left  for  dead  in  No  Man's  Land,  but  he  was 
still  on  the  job  working  for  civilization.  When 
I  spoke  to  this  big,  intelligent  animal  he  raised 
on  his  haunches  and  put  out  a  hairy  paw 
for  me  to  shake.  And  I  can  tell  you  I  was 
mighty  proud  to  shake  with  that  hero.  I 
believe  that  these  dogs  realize  that  the  world 
won't  be  a  fit  place  for  man  or  dog  if  the 
Boches  win  the  war.  That  is  why  they  are 
working  against  the  Hun  with  such  intelligence 
and  enthusiasm. 

One  of  the  trainers  told  me  that  the  dogs 
hate  the  Boche  like  poison. 

"You  see  that  big  mastiff  over  there .^"  he 
said,  pointing  to  a  big  brute  of  a  dog  munching 
at  a  slab  of  beef.  "Well,  that  animal  has 
accounted  for  five  Huns  so  far.     One  night 


118    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

out  in  No  Man's  Land  he  found  a  Boche 
sticking  a  bayonet  into  a  wounded  French 
soldier.  Prince,  the  mastiff  here,  reached  the 
throat  of  the  Hun  in  one  bound,  and  when 
the  stretcher  bearers  got  there  the  treacherous 
German  had  been  hterally  torn  to  pieces  by 
the  dog. 

"Another  night,  Prince  accompanied  a 
force  of  French  raiders  in  the  German  front- 
Hne  trenches.  You  see  that  scar  over  his  right 
leg?  Well,  that's  where  a  German  bayoneted 
him.  But  it  was  a  sorry  day  for  the  Hun  when 
he  tried  to  kill  the  dog.  Prince  snuffed  out 
the  Boche  and  killed  three  more  of  them 
before  he  returned  with  the  raiding  party. 

"Prince  has  been  on  several  raids  since 
then,  and  he  likes  them,  for  he  is  a  born 
soldier  and  a  loyal  Frenchman. 

"He  understands  every  wrinkle  of  the  raid 
idea,  and  has  intelligence  enough  not  to  try 
and  run  ahead  of  the  barrage. 

"And  Huns — why  that  dog  can  smell  them 
jSve  miles  off.  He  always  barks  deep  down 
in  his  chest  when  he  scents  a  Boche.     It's  a 


CAMP  LIFE  119 

blood-curdling  sound — makes  you  shiver  to 
hear  it." 

I  looked  at  Prince  with  increased  respect. 
Any  soldier  would  have  been  proud  of  his 
record. 

"Why  wouldn't  it  be  a  good  idea,"  I  sug- 
gested, "to  train,  say,  a  thousand  big  dogs 
like  Prince  and  turn  them  loose  on  the  Ger- 
mans.^" 

"I  have  thought  of  that  same  idea  myself 
more  than  a  dozen  times, "  replied  the  trainer 
excitedly.  "The  Germans  have  proved  them- 
selves beasts,  and  why  not  set  beasts  to 
fighting  them.^  But  even  a  dog  is  lowering 
himself  to  fight  with  those  Boches. 

"But  a  thousand  dogs  like  Prince  would 
be  capable  of  wiping  out  a  German  division. 
These  dogs  have  no  fear  of  shell  fire,  machine 
guns  or  bombs.  They  move  right  along 
toward  their  objective  and  hunt  for  throats 
to  tear.  If  we  turned  loose  a  thousand  of 
these  dogs  into  a  German  trench,  the  carnage 
would  be  awful.  To  tell  the  truth,  I  wouldn't 
care  to  witness  the  fight." 


120    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"Nor  me  either,"  I  agreed  heartily.  The 
thought  of  it  was  enough  to  make  anybody 
shudder. 


CHAPTER  Xn 
Back  to  the  Front 

A  BOUT  seventy-five  per  cent  of  modern 
A\     war  IS  plain  hard  work. 

That  dawned  upon  me  with  force 
before  I  had  been  very  long  in  France.  You 
see,  the  Huns  were  a  long  time  preparing  for 
this  thing,  and  that  is  why  they  had  the 
bulge  on  us  at  the  start.  They  had  such  a 
wonderful  machinery  perfected  that  they 
could  do  a  whole  lot  more  than  we  could,  and 
with  less  work. 

The  Allies  had  to  put  in  some  mighty  hard 
digs  to  even  up  with  that  forty  years  of 
preparation  of  the  Hun.  But  they  are  bridg- 
ing the  gap  fast,  and  with  Uncle  Sam  to  help 
there  won't  be  any  gap  very  soon. 

The  latter  part  of  November  my  battery  was 
sent  to  a  nearby  camp  to  instruct  some  green 
United  States  army  ofiicers  how  to  handle 
horses  and  how  to  use  the  French  artillery. 

(121) 


122    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

We  found  we  had  some  job  on  our  hands 
before  we  had  been  there  twenty-four  hours. 
What  some  of  those  officers  didn't  know  about 
horses  and  guns  would  fill  several  books. 
Some  of  them  were  positively  numb  in  the 
head  and  didn't  appear  to  realize  it.  How 
some  of  them  buncoed  their  way  into  officers' 
jobs  I  don't  know.  But  they  didn't  fool 
General  Pershing  very  long;  he  weeded  them 
out  as  fast  as  he  got  wise  to  them,  and  replaced 
them  by  capable  men  who  had  the  proper 
makings. 

Well,  the  officer  that  was  wished  on  me  for 
training  had  brought  three  trunks  of  clothing 
with  him  from  the  states.  He  was  some 
dandy;  a  major  general  would  have  been 
content  with  his  layout  of  tailoring.  He 
must  have  thought  that  the  war  was  some 
sort  of  a  big  social  function  where  you  had 
to  be  ready  to  jump  at  a  minute's  notice  into 
an  English  walking  suit  or  a  dinner  coat. 
Maybe  he  thought  it  was  the  proper  thing  to 
go  into  action  in  an  evening  suit,  for  he  had 
two,  and  a  couple  of  silk  hats  to  match.     And 


BACK  TO  THE  FRONT  123 

uniforms!  Why  he  had  enough  of  them  to 
outfit  the  staff  of  a  brigade.  I  hope  he  paid 
his  tailor  bill  before  he  left  home,  for  if  he 
didn't  the  poor  suit-maker  will  surely  have 
to  file  a  petition  in  bankruptcy.  This  chap's 
outfit  couldn't  have  cost  a  cent  less  than 
three  thousand  bucks. 

My  officer  brought  a  portable  bath-tub 
over  with  him  too,  and  every  morning  before 
he  would  consent  to  do  any  drilling  he  would 
scramble  around  in  the  tub.  At  the  time  I 
felt  the  sorest  against  this  fellow  I  used  to 
wish  that  he'd  drown  in  the  tub.  After  he 
had  taken  his  "barth,"  manicured  his  nails, 
and  put  some  rose  scent  on  his  pocket  hand- 
kerchief, the  officer  would  get  into  his  uniform 
and  come  out  on  the  drill  grounds.  I  could 
see  that  it  shocked  the  fellow  terribly  when 
he  heard  me  swear,  for  he  would  squint  at  me 
through  his  monocle  in  the  most  supercilious 
manner.  That  monocle  was  the  bane  of  my 
life,  for  the  owner  kept  dropping  it,  and 
instead  of  picking  it  up  himself  would  insist 
that  I  bend  and  do  the  trick. 


124    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

After  the  glass  had  slipped  out  of  his  fingers, 
he  would  say  petulantly: 

"Ah,  fellow,  I  have  dropped  my  glars,  pick 
it  up,  please." 

The  only  comfort  I  obtained  from  stooping 
and  picking  it  up  was  that  it  gave  me  an 
opportunity  to  swear  softly  without  being 
detected. 

One  day  when  he  dropped  it,  I  put  my  heel 
upon  the  thing  when  he  wasn't  looking  and 
ground  it  to  bits.  I  thought  than  that  I 
would  be  relieved  forever  from  the  job  of 
picking  up  monocles,  but  I  reckoned  without 
my  host. 

"Awkward  fellow,"  he  observed  languidly 
when  he  saw  that  I  had  stepped  upon  his  glass. 

Inwardly  I  groaned  with  despair  when  he 
drew  a  whole  case  of  brand  new  monocles  out 
of  his  coat  pocket,  daintily  selected  one  and 
screwed  it  into  his  eye  and  put  the  case  back 
into  his  pocket. 

He  dropped  the  new  monocle  twenty  times 
that  day  if  he  did  once,  and  my  back  ached 
from  picking  it  up. 


BACK  TO  THE  FRONT  125 

I  had  my  troubles  when  I  undertook  to 
give  this  immaculate  fellow  instruction  in  the 
unharnessing  of  teams.  After  he  had 
scrambled  the  harness  around  a  few  minutes 
it  would  take  me  a  half  hour  to  get  out  the 
knots  and  snarls.  The  way  he  used  to  take 
off  a  bridle  made  me  grit  my  teeth.  He 
would  unbuckle  the  cheek  straps  on  the  bit  to 
get  the  bit  out  of  horse's  mouth.  In  taking 
the  saddle  off  a  horse  he  would  unbuckle  the 
quarter  strap  instead  of  undoing  the  cinch. 

Some  of  these  officers  were  so  fastidious 
that  they  needed  two  men  to  wait  upon  them, 
and  they  picked  men  right  from  the  battery 
to  polish  their  shoes  and  clean  their  clothes. 
It  made  us  very  sore,  for  we  figured  that  it  was 
bad  enough  to  try  to  teach  those  boneheads, 
without  having  to  act  as  their  servants.  But 
these  fastidious  officers  kept  disappearing, 
and  the  Germans  didn't  get  them  either. 
They  simply  returned  to  the  states,  where 
they  found  environments  sufficiently  lady- 
like to  make  them  comfortable  again. 

As  for  me,  I  was  relieved  of  the  job  of 


126    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

picking  up  monocles  and  teaching  oflScers 
how  to  harness  horses,  when  I  came  down 
with  a  very  bad  case  of  frozen  feet. 

I  was  sent  to  the  hospital,  and  it  felt  good 
to  get  there.  The  chow  was  good  and  the 
care  was  excellent.  I  spent  the  Christmas 
of  1917  in  the  hospital  and  I  will  never  forget 
that  day  as  long  as  I  live.  There  were  a  lot 
of  wounded  boys  there  and  we  had  a  jolly 
time  swapping  yarns. 

I  met  a  chap  there  by  the  name  of  McNichol 
from  Cleveland,  Ohio.  He  told  me  that  when 
he  first  went  into  the  trenches  his  ambition  was 
to  capture  a  real,  live  ferocious  Boche,  so  he 
could  write  of  his  exploit  to  a  certain  winsome, 
blue-eyed  lass  in  Ohio  who  had  placed 
McNichol  high  up  in  the  list  of  heroes. 

The  young  woman  had  written  something 
like  this  to  the  soldier:  "Oh,  please  capture  a 
Boche  so  that  I  can  tell  all  the  girls  about 
it." 

McNichol  wrote  back:  "Lizzie,  I'll  get  a 
Hun  for  you  or  bust  my  blamed  neck  trying." 

And  McNichol  meant  every  word  he  said 


BACK  TO  THE  FRONT  127 

too,  and  from  that  time  on  planned  ways 
and  means. 

One  night  when  the  mist  hung  low  in  No 
Man's  Land,  the  lieutenant  in  charge  of 
McNichol's  sector  observed  that  it  was  a  fine 
night  for  a  raid. 

A  few  minutes  later,  fifty  men,  including 
McNichol,  sallied  forth  into  No  Man's  Land. 

On  their  hands  and  knees  the  Americans 
crept  toward  the  German  trenches.  Sud- 
denly star  shells  soared  upward  from  the 
Hun  breastworks,  and  the  Americans  flattened 
out  on  their  bellies,  praying  they  would  not 
be  seen.  They  escaped  detection,  and  when 
the  blackness  settled  down  again  they  resumed 
their  slow  advance. 

When  the  members  of  the  little  band 
came  to  the  German  wire  entanglements, 
they  pulled  out  their  wire  cutters,  and  began 
the  dangerous  and  tedious  work  of  opening 
up  a  path  through  the  maze  of  steel.  Luck 
seemed  to  be  with  them,  for  they  cut  through 
the  last  wire  without  beinff  detected. 

The  Huns  were  taken  completely  by  sur- 


128    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

prise  when  a  few  minutes  later  the  Americans 
with  wild  yells  leaped  into  their  first-line 
trench.  The  invaders  hurled  grenades  and 
fired  their  automatics. 

McNichol  had  just  one  thing  on  his  mind, 
and  that  was  to  make  good  his  promise  to  the 
little  girl  back  in  Ohio.  After  he  had  tossed 
his  grenades,  and  emptied  the  chambers  of 
his  revolver,  he  leaped  upon  the  back  of  the 
German  nearest  to  him. 

It  happened  that  he  selected  for  his  quarry- 
one  of  those  Prussian,  beer-fed  monstrosities 
weighing  about  two  hundred  and  fifty  pounds, 
but  McNichol  had  no  time  to  make  a  selection. 
In  his  mind,  a  Hun  was  a  Hun,  big,  little  or  in- 
different. Poking  his  automatic  under  the  fat 
jowl  of  the  terrified  Boche,  McNichol  growled: 

"You  are  my  prisoner.  No  funny  business 
now,  or  I'll  bore  you.    Double  quick — march.'* 

The  big  Hun  understood  the  order,  for  he 
waddled  dolefully  out  of  the  trench,  and 
McNichol  brought  up  the  rear,  now  and  then 
giving  his  prisoner  a  suggestive  poke  in  the 
ribs  with  the  muzzle  of  his  pistol. 


BACK  TO  THE  FRONT  129 

McNichol's  buddies  nearly  died  laughing 
when  he  walked  in  with  the  fat  boy,  but  he 
didn't  care  a  rap  about  that.  A  few  weeks 
later  the  little  girl  back  in  Ohio  was  delighted 
when  she  learned  that  her  sweetheart  had  kept 
his  promise  and  captured  a  Boche. 

But  McNichol  didn't  think  it  necessary  to 
tell  her  in  his  letter  that  the  prisoner  he  had 
taken  had  proved  to  be  the  cook  of  the  German 
sector.  No,  why  should  he.^^  There's  no  use 
being  a  joy-killer  when  it  concerns  your  best 
girl. 


CHAPTER  Xin 

SCOTTY,    THE   IrREPKESSIBLE 

ONE  of  the  most  entertaining  charac- 
ters I  met  at  the  hospital  was  a 
Yankee  called  Scotty,  who  gave  me 
a  thrilling  account  of  how  a  bunch  of  Ameri- 
cans in  the  Canadian  contingent  received 
the  news  of  the  entrance  of  Uncle  Sam  in 
the  war  in  April,  1917. 

Scotty  had  been  gassed,  but  he  was  on  the 
high  road  to  recovery  when  he  and  I  collided. 
He  was  formerly  an  American  telgraph  oper- 
ator— one  of  the  roving  kind  who  had  tapped 
the  key  to  the  accompaniment  of  the  Morse 
code,  from  Chicago  to  New  Orleans,  and 
from  Boston  to  'Frisco.  He  was  long,  lean 
and  lank,  with  legs  like  stilts  and  arms  like 
bean  poles,  but  his  muscles  were  as  of  steel. 
I  found  that  out  when  he  reached  out  of  his 
cot  and  grasped  my  hand.     When  he  let  go 

(180) 


SCOTTY,  THE  IRREPRESSIBLE        131 

my  paw  I  felt  as  though  it  had  been  mashed  in 
a  coffee  grinder. 

From  a  Scotch-Irish  ancestry,  this  buddy 
had  inherited  a  keen  love  of  fighting,  when 
the  fighting  was  hard  and  fast.  He  told  me 
in  detail  the  story  of  that  memorable  night 
when  the  news  reached  the  trenches  that  the 
United  States  was  in  the  war,  and  I  will  repeat 
it  as  accurately  as  possible. 

On  a  particular  evening  in  April,  1917, 
Scotty  said  to  his  buddy,  one  Jack  Murdock, 
of  Albany  N.Y.: 

"Jack,  this  is  getting  too  slow  for  me,  lying 
around  in  this  beastly  trench,  doing  nothing 
but  wallow  in  mud  and  duck  shells.  I  joined 
the  Canadian  contingent  to  fight,  not  to 
fester  in  muck  and  get  rheumatism." 

"Time  'parently  ain't  ripe  for  taking  a 
swat  at  the  Huns, "  replied  Murdock,  whiffing 
at  his  corncob  pipe. 

"  Ripe ! "  snorted  Scotty  disgustedly.  "  We'd 
soon  make  the  Boches  ripe  if  we  could  get  at 
them  with  our  bayonets." 

"  Oh,  lay  off  that  stuff, "  protested  Murdock. 


132    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"Don't  grit  your  teeth  at  me  that  way;  I'm 
not  to  blame  because  you  can't  jump  into 
Berlin  tonight  and  slit  the  Kaiser's  throat." 

Just  then  a  sergeant  hurried  into  the  trench 
from  a  communicating  passage.  He  was 
covered  with  mud  and  his  eyes  gleamed  with 
excitement. 

"Boys,"  he  yelled,  "the  biggest  news  yet; 
the  United  States  has  declared  war  on  Ger- 
many and  Uncle  Sam  is  going  to  ship  a  big 
army  into  France." 

The  rangy  Scotty  was  on  his  feet  with  a 
whoop.  He  grabbed  the  sergeant  by  the 
shoulders  with  his  knotty  hands  and  said 
huskily: 

"Say  that  again,  old  man,  and  at  the  same 
time  kick  me  so  that  if  I  am  dreaming  I'll 
wake  up." 

The  sergeant  repeated  the  joyous  message 
and  at  the  same  time  gave  Scotty  a  dig  in  the 
shins  with  his  foot. 

"Hurrah!"  shouted  Scotty.  "Old  Uncle 
Sammy  has  his  dander  up  at  last."  He  exe- 
cuted a  little  war  dance  around  the  trench. 


SCOTTY,  THE  IRREPRESSIBLE        133 

The  news  raced  up  and  down  the  sector 
like  wildfire,  and  the  Canadians  joined  in  the 
joy-fest  of  their  Yankee  comrades. 

As  for  Scotty,  he  grew  more  excited  every 
minute  as  the  import  of  the  tidings  sank  into 
his  intelligence. 

Finally  he  grabbed  a  rifle  with  one  hand  and 
seized  an  American  flag  with  the  other.  His 
keen  gray  eyes  burned  with  the  old  fighting 
fire  of  his  Scotch  ancestors. 

"Come  on,  Yanks,"  he  yelled.  "Over  the 
top  for  us;  we'll  be  disgraced  for  life  if  we 
didn't  serve  notice  on  the  Boches  over  yonder 
that  Uncle  Sam  has  jumped  into  the  war  with 
both  feet.  Every  blamed  one  of  you  who  has 
red  American  blood  in  his  veins,  come  on 
over." 

Yelling  like  an  Apache,  Scotty  cleared  the 
sandbags  with  a  mighty  bound,  and  he  was 
followed  over  by  a  hundred  or  more  Yanks. 

A  Canadian  lieutenant  shouted  something 
about  violation  of  orders,  but  he  might  as 
well  have  tried  to  carry  on  a  dialogue  with  the 
wind. 


184    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

Fortune  favored  the  raiders,  for  there 
happened  to  be  a  break  in  the  barbed  wire 
barrier  of  the  enemy,  and  through  this  rushed 
the  Americans,  with  Scotty  at  their  head, 
waving  the  Stars  and  Stripes. 

It  was  a  thrilling  moment,  and  the  dumb- 
founded Canadians  back  in  the  trench  expect- 
ed every  minute  to  see  the  little  band  wither 
up  imder  a  fusillade  of  machine-gun  bullets. 

But  the  Huns  were  evidently  not  even 
dreaming  of  such  a  reckless  assault,  for  they 
didn't  fire  a  shot.  The  Americans  leaped 
into  the  German  first-line  trench  and  shot 
down  a  score  or  more  of  Boches  before  the 
enemy  realized  what  had  happened.  Fifteen 
of  the  enemy  threw  down  their  arms  and 
surrendered.  The  prisoners  were  marched 
back  to  the  Canadian  line  by  Scotty  and  his 
delighted  men. 

The  commanding  officer  of  the  sector  sum- 
moned Scotty  and  wanted  to  know  why  the 
raid  was  made  in  violation  of  orders. 

"We  couldn't  help  it.  Colonel,"  explained 
Scotty.      "When  we  heard  that  Uncle  Sam 


SCOTTY,  THE  IRREPRESSIBLE        185 

was  in,  we  just  had  to  go  over  and  cele- 
brate." 

The  officer  grinned  in  spite  of  himself,  and 
besides  he  was  from  Toronto  and  knew  some- 
thing about  the  Yankee  fighting  spirit. 

"See  that  it  don't  happen  again,"  he  said, 
turning  his  face  away  to  hide  his  amusement. 

Early  in  my  yarn  I  praised  the  courage  of 
American  soldiers  of  alien  parentage,  and  I 
want  to  do  it  again,  for  they  are  doing  a  noble 
work  for  democracy  over  there. 

While  my  feet  were  getting  well  in  the  hos- 
pital I  heard  the  tale  of  Nick  Kornies,  a 
Greek  youth,  who  was  formerly  a  vender  of 
bananas  at  Fifteenth  Street  and  Avenue  D 
in  New  York. 

The  streams  of  humanity  that  daily  coursed 
by  his  humble  pushcart  had  no  realization 
that  this  mild  immigrant  lad  from  New  York's 
seething  East  Side  was  a  potential  hero.  It 
is  safe  to  say  that  any  of  the  men  or  women 
who  bought  bananas  from  Nick  Kornies  would 
have  laughed  increduously  if  anybody  had 
predicted  before  the  lapse  of  many  months 


136    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

an  entire  nation  would  pay  homage  to  this 
obscure  Greek  boy.  Yet  that  is  just  what  did 
occur. 

Nick  Komies  had  no  idea  himself  what 
the  future  held,  so  why  should  strangers  be 
able  to  guess  .^^  He  was  a  dreamer,  but  he 
never  dared  to  hope  that  his  dreams  would 
come  true.  The  big  war  overseas  was  a 
vague,  distant  thing  as  far  as  he  was  con- 
cerned; the  only  times  when  it  penetrated 
even  slightly  into  his  consciousness  was  when 
he  heard  the  shrill  voices  of  the  newsboys 
calling  oflF  the  headlines  which  told  of  gains, 
defeats  or  deadlocks  in  the  war  zone  in  France. 

Though  this  great  modern  struggle  for  the 
preservation  of  democracy  disturbed  not  the 
simple  soul  of  Nick  Kornies,  he  thought  much 
of  the  stirring  deeds  of  the  old  Greek  heroes. 
His  parents  had  raised  him  on  the  legends  of 
Agamemnon  and  Hector,  so  he  grew  up  with 
a  warrior's  heart. 

Nick  Kornies  might  have  gone  on  indefi- 
nitely as  a  banana  vender  and  a  dreamer  had 
not  he  heard  a  French  soldier  in  New  York 


SCOTTY,  THE  IRREPRESSIBLE        137 

making  an  appeal  for  recruits  to  fight  the 
Hun.  From  the  lips  of  this  warrior  of  modern 
democracy,  Kornies  heard  the  message  that 
brought  his  soul  up  to  date  and  inspired  him 
with  the  ambition  to  give  his  life  if  necessary 
in  the  holy  cause  of  France.  The  invasion 
of  that  country  by  the  barbarous  Huns 
recalled  to  his  mind  that  march  of  the  Persian 
legions  upon  ancient  Athens. 

He  enlisted  in  the  Foreign  Legion,  and  it 
was  at  Verdun  that  this  idealistic  young 
soldier  proved  to  the  world  that  the  spirit  of 
Ancient  Greece  is  not  dead. 

When  the  order  came  from  the  French 
commander  to  take  a  certain  section  of  the 
German  first-line  trenches,  Kornies  led  his 
comrades  over  No  Man's  Land  in  the  face  of 
a  terrific  storm  of  shells  and  bullets. 

Only  about  half  of  the  courageous  band, 
including  the  Greek  youth,  reached  the  Ger- 
man trench.  There  they  engaged  in  hand-to- 
hand  combat  with  the  enemy.  Bayonets, 
trench  knives  and  grenades  figured  in  the 
struggle.     Kornies  was  everywhere,  encourag- 


138    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

ing  his  comrades  by  his  utter  contempt  for 
death.  He  killed  six  Germans  and  captured 
several  others  single-handed.  The  enemy 
was  completely  routed,  the  French  taking 
over  the  trench  for  a  distance  of  1,500  yards. 

The  following  day,  the  former  New  York 
banana  vender  was  decorated  with  the  War 
Cross,  and  the  Military  Medal,  and  was 
kissed  on  both  cheeks  by  an  admiring  French 
general. 

The  French  Republic  has  recorded  the 
heroism  of  Nick  Kornies  in  the  following 
phraseology : 

*' Kornies  (Nick),  Legionnaire,  Eleventh 
Company  de  Marche,  Foreign  Legion — elite 
grenadier;  20th  August,  1917,  won  the  admira- 
tion of  all  his  comrades  by  his  courage  and 
his  contempt  for  danger.  Led  his  comrades 
to  the  conquest  of  a  trench  which  was 
defended  with  energy,  and  which  was  captured 
along  a  distance  of  1,500  yards  after  several 
hours  of  bloody  combat;  took  single-handed 
numerous  prisoners;  already  cited  twice  in 
army  orders." 


SCOTTY,  THE  IRREPRESSIBLE        139 

That's  the  kind  of  stuff  our  immigrants  are 
made  of,  fellow  Americans.  Let's  take  off 
our  hats  to  them. 


^ 


CHAPTER  XIV 

German  Atrocities 

MY  blood  boiled  when  the  story  of  the 
first  American  prisoner  taken  by  the 
Germans  reached  the  hospital. 

Every  one  of  we  Americans  wanted  to  leave 
our  cots  at  once  and  go  Hun-hunting.  The 
nurses  had  all  they  could  do  to  restrain  us. 

The  first  American  prisoner  taken  was  a 
sergeant,  the  censors  prohibit  naming  him  or 
his  unit.  He  was  captured  after  a  plucky 
fight  and  removed  to  a  prison  camp  in  Ger- 
many. En  route  there  he  was  fearfully 
abused  by  the  Boches;  oflScers  banged  him 
with  the  flat  of  their  swords,  children  threw 
rocks  at  him  and  women  spit  upon  him. 
Fine,  kind  ladylike  persons  those  German 
women. 

When  the  sergeant  arrived  at  the  prison 
camp,  the  Boche  oflScer  in  charge  said  to  him: 

"We  are  going  to  give  you  a  bath,  plenty 

(140) 


GERMAN  ATROCITIES  141 

to  eat  and  a  change  of  clothing  so  that  when 
you  get  back  to  the  United  States  you  can 
tell  your  Yankee  friends  how  well  the  Ger- 
mans used  you." 

The  sergeant  did  get  a  bath,  some  clothes 
and  chow  as  the  officer  had  promised. 

Then  he  was  escorted  by  the  officer  to  a 
room  where  there  was  a  barber's  chair.  He 
was  ordered  to  sit  down  in  the  chair,  which 
he  did. 

A  barber  stood  near  sharpening  a  razor. 

"Give  the  American  a  good  shave,"  ordered 
the  officer  with  a  cruel  sneer. 

Two  German  soldiers  leaped  forward  and 
strapped  the  American  to  the  chair.  The 
barber  with  quick  strokes  cut  off  the  ears  of 
the  poor  chap.  Then  a  Prussian  surgeon 
inoculated  the  sergeant  with  the  germs  of  a 
dread  disease. 

"This  is  the  way  we  use  Americans," 
jeered  the  Boche  officer  as  the  sergeant  lay 
bleeding  and  suffering. 

From  reliable  reports  from  Germany's  inte- 
rior we  know  the  sergeant  survived  the  terrible 


142    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

torture,  but  of  course  he  is  disfigured  for 
life.  We  have  learned  the  identity  of  the 
inhuman  butcherers  who  mutilated  him,  and 
may  the  devil  help  them  if  they  ever  fall  into 
the  hands  of  the  Americans. 

While  in  France  I  talked  with  a  French 
corporal  who  had  spent  six  months  in  a 
German  prison  camp.  The  stories  he  told 
me  of  the  barbarous  treatment  of  prisoners 
by  the  Boches  made  my  blood  run  cold  and 
increased  my  hatred  of  the  Hun. 

He  was  interned  in  a  camp  with  French 
and  English  prisoners.  Upon  one  instance, 
because  a  French  prisoner  wished  to  share 
his  soup  with  a  fellow  countryman,  the 
German  sentinel  reached  through  the  wire 
enclosure  about  the  camp  and  stabbed  the 
Frenchman  in  the  stomach  with  a  bayonet. 
The  man  later  died.  Upon  another  occasion, 
without  any  apparent  reason,  eight  Boche 
barbarians  in  uniform  entered  the  stockade 
and  beat  to  death  an  English  prisoner.  My 
friend,  the  corporal,  protested  at  the  terrible 
thing,  and  he  was  struck  in  the  face  with  the 


GERMAN  ATROCITIES  143 

butt  end  of  a  riifle.  He  carries  a  scar  as  evi- 
dence of  the  cowardly  blow. 

The  corporal  said  that  he  and  his  fellow 
prisoners  were  often  compelled  to  work  under 
heavy  shell  fire  behind  the  German  lines. 
They  were  denied  clothing  and  adequate 
shelter,  and  hundreds  of  them  died  from 
starvation. 

When  the  corporal  first  reached  the  prison 
camp  he  absolutely  refused  to  engage  in  any 
work  that  would  benefit  Germany.  He  was 
given  a  choice  to  work  or  be  starved  to  death, 
but  still  refused  to  labor.  For  six  days  he 
stood  at  attention  from  six  o'clock  in  the 
morning  until  noon.  At  the  end  of  the  sixth 
day  he  was  locked  up  in  a  wet  cellar.  He 
remained  there  for  five  days,  but  his  deter- 
mination was  still  of  steel. 

The  corporal  was  led  out  of  the  cellar  and 
stood  up  with  thirty  other  prisoners  who  had 
refused  to  work.  A  German  officer  informed 
them  unless  they  consented  to  labor  they 
would  be  shot.  All  of  the  prisoners  with 
the  exception  of  the  corporal  and  ten  other 


144    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

prisoners  weakened  and  said  they  would 
work.  The  corporal  and  the  other  men  who 
had  courageously  stuck  to  their  guns  asked 
the  Boche  oflScer  to  shoot  them  and  put  them 
out  of  their  misery. 

But  the  Hun  had  quite  another  plan  for 
the  application  of  German  Kultur.  The 
arms  of  the  prisoners  were  twisted  behind  their 
backs,  their  wrists  were  tied  with  a  rope  and 
they  were  led  each  to  a  post  and  backed 
against  it;  they  were  made  to  stand  on  wooden 
blocks  while  their  hands  were  tied  as  high  as 
possible  to  the  post. 

The  blocks  were  then  kicked  out  from 
under  them  and  they  were  left  suspended  by 
their  wrists  with  their  feet  off  the  ground. 
They  remained  thus  suspended  for  two  hours. 

The  next  day  the  process  was  repeated  and 
one  of  the  men  broke  down  and  consented  to 
work.  Torture  of  the  remainder  was  con- 
tinued and  was  followed  by  beatings  with 
rifle  butts.  Then  they  were  subjected  to  four 
more  hours  of  hanging,  when  consciousness 
left  all  with  the  exception  of  the  corporal. 


GERMAN  ATROCITIES  145 

Those  who  succumbed  were  carried  in  a 
cellar  and  thrown  on  wet  stones. 

Altogether  the  corporal  hung  twelve  hours 
on  his  post.  Had  he  not  possessed  an  iron 
constitution  he  would  have  died.  Finally 
the  Huns  saw  they  could  not  kill  him  by  that 
method,  so  they  cut  him  down.  He  was 
given  a  shovel,  but  he  threw  it  away  con- 
temptuously. The  Boches  did  not  ask  him 
to  work  after  that. 

The  corporal  informed  me  that  each  prisoner 
is  marked  with  a  number,  indicating  the 
degree  of  his  health  and  strength.  No.  1 
means  good  for  any  work;  No.  2,  good  for 
field  labor;  No.  3,  good  for  light  work;  and 
No.  4,  incapable  of  work.  These  numbers 
are  tattooed  on  the  right  hand,  together  with 
the  letters  "Kr-Gef,"  which  are  abbreviations 
for  war  prisoner. 

Prisoners  are  made  to  work  without  any 
consideration  for  their  ages,  social  rank,  apti- 
tude or  strength.  Doctors  of  law  or  of 
philology,  college  and  high  school  professors 
are  working  as  farm  hands  or  in  mines;  men 


146    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

whom  the  Germans  themselves  acknowledge 
to  be  sick  and  excusable  are  employed  from 
morning  to  night  unloading  the  vessels  which 
bring  ore  from  Sweden  into  Germany.  Sen- 
tries stand  over  them  with  rifles,  and  the 
minute  any  poor  wretch  falters  in  his  work 
he  feels  the  prick  of  the  bayonet. 

The  prisoners  who  work  on  farms  are  fed 
on  turnips,  nettles,  barley  gruel  and  Indian 
cornmeal,  almost  exclusively.  Virtually  all 
potatoes  in  Germany  have  been  requisitioned. 
The  orders  are  that  the  hours  of  labor  shall 
be  determined  by  the  farmers.  In  the  sum- 
mer the  prisoners  work  fifteen  and  sixteen 
hours  a  day.  If  a  prisoner  makes  a  kick,  the 
peasant  appeals  to  a  sentry,  who  comes  run- 
ning up  with  his  bayonet. 

The  corporal  said  he  learned  that  a  large 
number  of  prisoners  had  been  put  to  work  in 
the  salt  mines  at  Kaliwerk,  Germany.  The 
salt  is  used  especially  for  the  manufacture  of 
suffocating  gases  which  the  Huns  are  turning 
loose  on  our  lines. 

The  galleries  in  these  mines  are  at  depths 


GERMAN  ATROCITIES  147 

which  vary  from  two  hundred  to  seven  hun- 
dred meters  (about  650  to  2,300  feet).  The 
heat  is  so  intense  that  the  men  work  absolutely 
naked  with  the  exception  of  wooden  shoes. 
The  air  is  filled  with  poisonous  vapors  which 
bring  irresistible  drowsiness. 

At  the  end  of  a  few  months  in  these  hell 
holes  the  prisoners  break  out  with  boils  and 
incurable  running  sores. 

In  September,  1917,  the  corporal  said  that 
several  hundred  British  prisoners,  many  of 
them  wounded,  were  brought  into  the  camp 
where  he  was  interned.  They  were  marched 
into  camp  between  two  lines  of  German 
troops.  The  Boche  soldiers  kicked  the  Brit- 
ishers and  struck  them  with  sabres  and  bay- 
onets. Men  with  walking  sticks  had  them 
taken  from  them  and  were  beaten  with  them; 
men  with  crutches  had  these  kicked  from 
under  their  arms,  and  when  they  fell  they 
were  beaten  with  the  crutches.  Senior  Ger- 
man officers  were  present  and  joined  in  the 
attack. 

My  friend,  the  French  corporal,  escaped 


148    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

from  the  German  prison  camp  into  Switzer- 
land, and  is  now  back  in  the  trenches  fighting 
the  cause  of  civilization  with  renewed  vigor. 
His  experience  in  Germany  has  convinced 
him  that  life  would  not  be  worth  living  in  a 
world  dominated  by  the  Hun. 

But  Germany's  brutality  to  helpless  prison- 
ers is  but  a  small  part  of  her  campaign  of 
frightfulness.  In  every  German  regiment 
there  is  what  is  known  as  a  "Hellish  Squad." 
Their  job  is  to  poison  wells,  cut  off  the  hands 
of  children  and  plant  mines  and  bombs  in 
villages. 

The  War  Department  at  Washington  has 
taken  precautions  against  American  soldiers 
being  caught  by  the  snares  and  traps  which 
the  "Hellish  Squads"  spread  thickly  through 
territory  they  are  forced  to  evacuate.  A 
special  brochure  on  this  subject  has  been  pre- 
pared by  the  intelligence  division  of  the  gen- 
eral staff  for  ofiicers,  who  are  to  be  held 
responsible  for  the  proper  warning  of  their 
men. 

The  following  extracts  from  the  pamphlet 


GERMAN  ATROCITIES  149 

will  give  a  good  idea  what  Americans  have  to 
contend  with  in  fighting  the  men-beasts  of 
Germany: 

"Until  specialists  have  had  a  chance  to 
investigate,  one  must  be  very  suspicious  of: 
Shelters  which  are  excessively  well  furnished 
or  luxurious;  houses  that  seem  miraculously 
to  be  left  standing  among  ruins;  all  new 
work,  recently  constructed  trenches;  parts 
of  equipment  in  good  condition;  articles  stuck 
in  ground  or  walls  and  utensils  scattered 
around  trenches  or  shelters. 

"Stabling  for  horses  should  be  thoroughly 
disinfected  and  only  used  cautiously  after 
burning  all  bedding,  straw  and  oats  left  by 
the  enemy. 

"The  sign  of  'Use  of  this  water  is  forbidden,' 
must  be  placed  above  all  sources  of  water 
supply  until  analyzed  by  technical  experts. 

"Listening  tests  must  be  made  in  all  build- 
ings, galleries  and  subterranean  chambers  to 
make  sure  that  there  are  no  clockwork- 
driven  infernal  machines. 

"Roads   should   be   made   the   subject   of 


150    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

painstaking  inspection  to  detect  mines  pre- 
pared for  their  destruction. 

"  One  should  be  careful  to  cut  all  suspicious 
looking  threads,  being  careful  not  to  sever 
those  stretched  tightly,  for  they  may  support 
weights,  which  fall  and  strike  detonators." 

We  artillery  boys  found  that  a  favorite 
trick  of  the  "Hellish  Squad"  is  to  leave  one 
of  the  spiked  German  helmets  that  every 
Allied  soldier  covets  as  a  trophy,  lying  appar- 
ently innocently  on  the  ground,  and  underneath 
a  detonating  device  for  a  mine  that  would 
blow  to  atoms  the  soldier  who  picked  it  up. 

But  perhaps  the  most  hellish  trick  of  the 
"Hellish  Squad"  is  known  as  the  "double 
coffin." 

Counting  on  the  Allied  troops  desiring  to 
give  a  decent  burial  to  any  dead  they  find  in 
captured  places,  the  Germans  place  one  coffin 
on  top  of  another.  The  instant  the  upper 
coffin  is  moved  a  charge  of  high  explosive  is 
detonated  and  the  soldiers  who  suppose  them- 
selves about  to  perform  the  last  office  for  a 
dead  enemy  are  themselves  killed. 


GERMAN  ATROCITIES  151 

The  indictment  against  the  Hun  is  growing 
daily;  there  seems  to  be  no  limit  against  his 
infamy.  Yet  the  worst  thing  he  does  is  to 
make  brutal  war  against  little  children.  I 
have  told  about  the  little  boy  who  had  his 
hands  cut  oflf  at  the  wrists,  and  now  I  will 
relate  a  case  even  more  terrible. 

In  the  little  shell-torn  village  where  my 
battery  was  quartered  when  we  first  moved 
up  to  the  front  line,  lived  a  young  French 
mother  with  her  two-year-old  son.  Just 
before  this  son  was  born  she  was  taken  prisoner 
by  some  German  cavalrymen,  and  sent  to  a 
hospital  in  Germany.  When  her  child  was 
born  it  was  taken  from  her  and  returned  two 
weeks  later,  with  its  sight  destroyed. 

"If  your  child  had  been  a  girl,"  explained 
the  brutish  German  surgeon,  *'we  would  not 
have  done  this.  But  we  of  the  Fatherland 
must  make  sure  that  the  French  will  never 
again  take  up  arms  against  Germany." 

With  her  face  full  of  woe  and  tragedy,  the 
mother  told  me  this  story,  and  I  swore  ven- 
gence  against  the  Hun  as  the  tale  slipped  from 


152    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

her  trembling  lips.  Nestled  in  her  lap  as 
she  gave  me  every  detail  was  the  living  evi- 
dence of  the  crime — the  poor  little  two-year- 
old  who  is  doomed  to  go  through  life  sight- 
less because  of  German  Kultur. 

If  the  Germans  hope  to  scare  Americans 
by  their  campaign  of  frightfulness  they  are 
going  to  be  badly  fooled.  Every  time  a 
Yankee  boy  comes  in  contact  with  one  of 
these  cases,  it  simply  whets  his  desire  to 
kill  another  Boche. 

I  was  discharged  from  the  hospital  Jan- 
uary 2,  1918,  and  rejoined  my  battery.  -  The 
boys  were  tickled  to  death  to  see  me,  and 
I  was  glad  to  get  back,  you  can  bet  your 
bottom  dollar  on  that.  We  returned  to  the 
front  line  January  22d,  and  straightway 
jumped  into  the  hottest  fighting  of  the  war. 


CHAPTER  XV 

Strafing  the  Enemy 

WE  relieved  a  battery  of  French- 
Moroccan  artillerymen,  curious 
looking  chaps,  decked  out  in  khaki 
uniforms,  red  fezzes,  puttees  and  regulation 
French  hob-nail  shoes. 

These  fellows  are  smashing  good  fighters, 
but  are  the  dirtiest  in  their  personal  habits  of 
any  soldiers  in  France,  with  the  exception, 
perhaps,  of  the  Indian  troops  from  India. 

They  have  black,  fierce-looking  moustaches, 
and  are  continually  scrapping  among  them- 
selves. They  have  no  fear  of  death  and  will 
never  admit  defeat. 

The  dugout  we  moved  into  that  night  had 
been  occupied  by  these  troops  for  nearly  a 
year,  and  was  alive  with  vermin.  It  was 
quite  evident  that  the  rat  kingdom  had 
established  its  capital  there,  for  the  place  was 
overrun  with  rodents.     Some  of  them  were 

(153) 


154    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

big  enough  to  wear  helmets  and  gas  masks 
and  go  over  the  top  in  a  bayonet  charge. 
When  I  waked  up  the  next  morning  I  found 
that  a  rat  had  eaten  his  way  through  my 
overcoat  and  blouse  and  stolen  a  cake  of 
chocolate  out  of  my  shirt  pocket.  Part  of 
the  uppers  of  one  of  my  shoes  was  eaten 
away.  Before  breakfast  I  shot  one  of  the 
pests  and  found  he  was  nearly  as  big  as  a 
house  cat. 

And  the  cooties — ^say,  I  never  saw  such 
cooties.  They  were  fully  a  quarter  of  an 
inch  long,  and  when  they  drove  their  pincers 
into  you,  it  felt  like  being  stabbed  with  a 
pair  of  garden  shears. 

The  whole  outfit  was  on  the  scratch  that 
morning;  we  adjourned  to  a  sunny  spot  and 
took  off  our  shirts  and  went  on  a  still  hunt 
through  them.  We  were  thus  engaged  when 
a  shell  dropped  within  a  hundred  yards  of 
us  and  exploded  with  a  fearful  bang.  We 
did  not  linger  a  second.  Leaving  our  shirts 
lying  on  the  ground,  we  scrambled  head  first 
into  the  dugout.     There  was  another  bang 


STRAFING  THE  ENEMY  155 

that  shook  the  sand  out  of  the  turf  over  our 
heads. 

When  we  peered  cautiously  out  of  the  dug- 
out we  saw  our  shirts  were  gone;  the  second 
shell  had  landed  right  on  top  of  them  and 
blown  them  to  shreds.  There  was  one  con- 
solation, though — the  blasted  cooties  had  gone 
into  kingdom  come  with  the  shirts. 

After  much  study  of  the  cootie  problem, 
I  discovered  a  way  to  outwit  them.  I  wore 
two  vests  and  turned  each  one  of  them  inside 
out  every  two  hours,  on  the  theory  that  it 
took  the  pests  about  two  hours  to  make  the 
round  trip  of  the  garments.  By  this  method 
I  managed  to  keep  them  on  the  outside  all 
the  time,  that  is  if  I  didn't  forget  to  turn  the 
vests.  I  quite  frequently  forgot  to  turn 
them  on  schedule  time,  and  then  the  cooties 
beat  me  to  it  and  started  chewing  my  hide 
again. 

The  cook  of  our  battery  had  a  very  bad 
case  of  cold  feet,  and  consequently  the  chow 
suffered.  He  was  more  afraid  of  a  shell 
than   an   old    woman    of   a    thunderstorm. 


156    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

Every  time  he  heard  a  shell  whistling  he'd 
go  under  the  bunk  head  first.  It  didn't 
make  any  difference  what  he  had  cooking; 
he'd  let  everything  burn  up  rather  than 
come  out  before  he  thought  the  danger  was 
over. 

In  order  to  bring  the  chow  to  the  boys,  the 
cook  had  to  walk  out  into  the  open  and  go 
from  one  dugout  to  another.  And  the  worst 
of  it  was  that  the  Boches  always  started 
shelling  us  around  mealtime.  If  a  shell 
fell  within  a  quarter  of  a  mile  of  that  cook, 
he'd  drop  the  slum-kettle,  spilling  the  con- 
tents, and  do  a  Marathon  back  to  his  dugout. 
On  the  second  day  we  got  back  to  the  front, 
the  cook  dropped  three  slum-kettles  in  that 
manner,  and  we  were  some  sore,  for  we  were 
as  hungry  as  a  lot  of  woodchucks.  In  fact, 
we  were  so  hot  under  the  collars  that  we 
manned  our  guns  and  gave  the  Boches  a 
salvo,  just  to  show  him  we  resented  getting 
our  chow  spilled  on  the  ground.  We  felt 
better  when  our  observer  signaled  us  that  our 
salvo  had  blown  up  three  of  the  enemy's  soup 


STRAFING  THE  ENEMY  157 

kitchens.  The  Huns  didn't  disturb  us  around 
mealtime  again  for  fully  a  week. 

One  day  I  tried  to  remonstrate  with  the 
cook  about  his  fear  of  shells. 

"You've  got  to  die  some  time,"  I  said 
consolingly,  "so  why  play  with  this  fear 
stuff  .'^  If  a  shell  hits  you,  you'll  never  know 
what  struck  you." 

"Maybe  I've  got  to  die  some  time,"  he 
replied  with  a  comical  shiver,  "but  I  don't 
want  to  go  just  now." 

The  American  sector  is  near  Toul,  one  of 
the  most  ancient  towns  in  Lorraine.  Before 
the  war  Toul  had  a  population  of  about 
15,000.  It  lies  in  the  valley  of  the  Moselle 
at  the  foot  of  a  range  of  imposing  hills. 
Nearby  flows  the  Moselle  River  and  a  sleepy 
old  canal,  which  in  times  of  peace  connected 
Germany  and  France,  being  the  artificial 
waterway  from  the  Rhine  to  the  Marne 
River.  In  1870  Toul  was  captured  by  the 
Germans.  It  is  now  a  fortress  of  the  first 
class  and  is  much  coveted  by  the  Huns, 

The  country  where  the  first  American  sec- 


158    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

tor  is  located  is  generally  low  ground  spotted 
with  little  hamlets  and  towns,  mostly  shell- 
torn  and  criss-crossed  by  succeeding  lines  of 
trenches,  strong  points  and  battery  positions, 
all  part  of  the  defense  of  both  Toul  and  Nance. 
The  principal  roads  in  the  district  have  been 
pretty  well  camouflaged  with  trees  and  with 
other  devices  known  to  the  French. 

A  large  portion  of  our  sector  is  wooded, 
and  there  are  picturesque  little  lakes  here 
and  there  that  gleam  like  mirrors  on  clear 
days.  Our  forward  lines  parallel  a  low 
ridge,  along  which  are  several  towns.  Behind 
this  ridge  are  concealed  a  network  of  Ameri- 
can batteries. 

On  a  clear  day  we  could  see  the  distant 
towers  of  the  Gothic  cathedral  in  the  Ger- 
men  -  held  Metz,  the  capital  of  German 
Lorraine. 

One  of  the  best  things  near  the  front  line 
are  the  French  co-operative  stores  which  are 
run  by  the  French  army.  They  have  been 
thrown  open  to  the  American  soldiers.  The 
prices  in   these  stores  are  very  reasonable. 


STRAFING  THE  ENEMY  159 

The  gloves  they  sell  are  very  warm.  We 
have  them  beat  in  the  matter  of  underwear, 
but  they  have  many  things  which  our  sup- 
ply chiefs  had  not  stocked  up  on  when  we 
got  into  the  scrap.  These  include  flash- 
lights, caps,  self-starting  pocket  fuses  for 
lighting  cigarettes,  and  other  knickknacks 
which  make  life  in  the  front  line  worth 
living. 

Every  son  in  our  battery  enlisted  as  artil- 
lerymen, of  course,  but  we  did  all  kinds  of 
extra  work  without  a  whimper.  Besides 
potting  away  at  the  Boche,  we  built  three  or 
four  miles  of  light  railway,  made  a  lot  of 
camouflage  and  constructed  dumps  for 
ammunition. 

Fixing  camouflage  is  interesting  work.  The 
best  kind  of  camouflage  is  the  wire  netting 
sort,  covered  with  marsh  grass  and  stretched 
overhead  like  a  roof.  It  looks  like  a  bit  of 
green  field  to  the  German  aviator  flying 
overhead,  and  prevents  them  from  mapping 
out  our  positions.  In  going  to  and  from 
dugouts  we  were  allowed  to  walk  only  on 


160    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

paths  that  had  been  carefully  camouflaged. 
If  we  had  taken  other  paths  the  enemy  air- 
men would  have  gotten  a  line  on  our  positions. 

Frequently  we  constructed  camouflage  care- 
lessly as  a  decoy.  The  German  airmen 
would  fall  for  the  bait  and  signal  back  to 
their  batteries.  The  Boche  gunners  would 
get  the  range  of  the  spot  covered  by  the  fake 
camouflage,  and  they  would  pepper  away, 
probably  with  the  thought  they  were  raising 
Cain  with  an  important  American  position. 
We  gunners  would  laugh  hilariously  and  fer- 
vently wish  the  Boches  would  keep  on  wasting 
their  anununition  that  way  forever. 

Sometimes  it  seemed  to  me  as  if  the  whole 
front  slept,  or  had  been  abandoned  by  men, 
so  dead  was  the  silence  that  reigned.  But 
at  these  times  I  found  that  the  watchfulness 
was  of  the  keenest,  and  that  more  is  to  be 
learned  of  the  enemy  and  his  plans  than  in 
periods  when  there  is  greater  activity. 

The  first  necessity  of  war  is  observation  of 
the  enemy's  line.  Upon  the  evidence  pro- 
duced day  by  day  by  piecing  together  the 


STRAFING  THE  ENEMY  161 

reports  of  thousands  of  observers,  the  whole 
tactical  scheme  is  hung. 

For  every  mile  of  front,  many  pairs  of  eyes 
are  perpetually  watching,  each  gleaning  an 
occasional  scrap  of  information,  here  or  there, 
seemingly  unimportant  in  itself,  but  actually 
a  fiber  in  the  web  of  knowledge  that  grows 
continually  at  some  far  off  headquarters. 
The  aim  of  all  this  watching  is  to  discover  the 
enemy's  intentions.  For  example,  if  he 
means  to  attack,  he  will  bring  up  and  retain 
a  large  number  of  troops  in  the  zone  where  the 
attack  is  to  be  launched.  If  he  abandons  the 
idea,  the  strength  will  be  reduced.  A  mass- 
ing of  batteries  heralds  a  bombardment. 
Considerable  movement  behind  the  enemy's 
lines  suggests  the  relief  of  a  division.  It  is  by 
continual  consideration  of  these  things  that  a 
commander  deduces  the  plans  of  his  opponent. 

The  ordinary  everyday  observation  is  em- 
braced under  three  main  heads — aground  obser- 
vations, kite  ballons  and  airplanes. 

The  ground  observation  work  is  done  in 
ground  posts,  and  the  duty  of  the  men  in 


162    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

these  stations  is  to  keep  their  eyes  peeled 
every  minute  on  the  enemy's  front-Une  trench 
system.  Sometimes  the  observer  is  concealed 
in  a  dugout  on  the  side  of  a  hill  or  he  may  be 
perched  on  the  top  of  a  chimney  with  a  hos- 
tile battery  trying  every  minute  to  knock 
down  the  chimney  with  a  well-aimed  shot. 
The  observer  is  provided  with  maps,  glasses, 
telephone,  and  a  note  book. 

Looking  through  his  peephole  the  observer 
sees  immediately  before  him  his  own  trench 
system,  then  No  Man's  Land,  torn  by  shell 
holes  and  filled  with  rusty  barbed  wire. 
Beyond  this  runs  the  irregular  line  of  the 
front  parapet  of  the  enemy,  and  behind  this 
the  enemy's  reserve  and  communication 
trenches.  Still  further  back  is  a  country 
dotted  with  ruined  farms  and  clumps  of 
trees  shorn  of  their  branches.  To  the  casual 
onlooker  there  is  no  sign  of  movement  in  this 
scene  of  desolation,  but  the  trained  observer 
sees  many  things  through  his  glasses,  things 
which  sometimes  help  to  win  battles  or  enable 
our  forces  to  anticipate  attacks  from  the  enemy. 


STRAFING  THE  ENEMY  163 

The  second  night  after  our  return  to  the 
front  we  were  ordered  to  drop  a  heavy  bar- 
rage into  the  German  front  Hne.  An  attack 
was  anticipated,  I  guess,  and  it  was  our  job 
to  see  that  it  didn't  come  off.  For  forty- 
minutes  we  pumped  shells  over  No  Man's 
Land,  mashing  in  many  yards  of  the  Boche 
front  Hne  and  preventing  the  enemy  from 
going  over  the  top. 

The  Boche  batteries,  located  about  6,500 
yards  away,  began  to  reply  hotly.  Shells  hit 
all  around  us,  blowing  up  dugouts  and  blast- 
ing big  holes  in  the  landscape.  I  kept  at  my 
gun  until  it  was  hot;  a  six-inch  shell  lit  within 
thirty  yards  of  me,  and  when  it  exploded  I 
saw  stars,  half-moons  and  other  constella- 
tions. At  first  I  thought  my  end  had  arrived, 
but  when  I  felt  myself  over,  I  saw  I  was  O.  K. 
A  minute  later  I  heard  a  noise  like  a  bottle  of 
water  being  hurled  through  the  air,  and  then 
came  the  warning  cry,  "Gas!" 

Right  then  and  there  I  had  my  first  experi- 
ence in  a  gas  attack,  and  it  was  a  hummer. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

The  Gas  Attack 

WE  clapped  on  our  masks  like  Hght- 
^  ning,  and  we  were  none  too  quick, 
for  already  we  were  beginning  to 
feel  the  effects  of  the  poisonous  vapors. 

The  enemy  sent  over  a  total  of  one  hun- 
dred shells  containing  vosgene  and  chlorine 
gas.  Five  Americans  were  killed  and  sixty- 
one  were  sent  to  the  hospital. 

The  gas  shells  were  fired  from  trench 
mortars  (minnenwerfers).  Officers  in  the 
front  line,  'phoning  for  barrage  fire  to  offset 
the  gas  attack,  found  the  wires  had  been  cut 
and  sent  up  rockets  as  a  signal  to  the  artillery 
in  the  rear. 

We  responded  to  the  signal  with  a  will  and 
within  an  hour  had  plugged  1,460  shells  into 
the  German  lines,  blasting  dugouts  and  muss- 
ing up  enemy  trenches  in  fine  shape.  We 
must  have  shuffled  oflF  a  lot  of  Boches  that 

(164) 


THE  GAS  ATTACK  165 

night.  I  have  never  had  had  doubt  but  that 
we  squared  up  for  the  Yankee  boys  who  were 
gassed.  The  Americans  who  were  killed  in 
the  attack  had  taken  refuge  in  dugouts. 

It  was  certainly  a  strange  experience  firing 
a  "75"  with  a  gas  mask  on.  I  had  a  smothery 
feeling  at  first,  and  could  hardly  see  the  sights 
of  my  gun.     But  I  got  used  to  it  after  a  while. 

Right  in  front  of  our  battery  was  a  grave- 
yard where  many  hundreds  of  French  soldiers 
had  been  buried. 

Occasionally  a  shell  would  light  in  the 
cemetery  and  dig  up  some  of  the  dead  ones. 
Just  then  it  was  no  place  for  a  superstitious 
person.  We  were  all  dog  tired  when  the 
firing  died  down  and  we  quit  for  the  night. 

My  battery  came  into  action  again  on 
January  29th,  when  the  Huns  threw  a  box 
barrage  around  one  of  our  listening  posts, 
cutting  oflF  our  men  there.  When  the  barrage 
lifted,  one  of  the  Yanks  in  the  post  saw  four 
Huns  approaching.  He  popped  at  them  with 
his  automatic  and  saw  one  of  them  fall.  He 
kept  on  firing  until  shell  splinters  hit  him  on 


166    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

the  head  and  arm.  He  lost  consciousness, 
and  didn't  wake  up  until  he  reached  the 
hospital. 

Right  here  I  want  to  assure  American 
mothers,  wives  and  sweethearts  that  the 
best  of  surgical  care  in  the  world  is  available 
to  their  loved  ones  fighting  in  France. 

First  there  is  a  medical  organization 
attached  to  each  regiment,  with  a  regimental 
infirmary  for  simple  cases.  There  is  also  a 
regimental  surgeon  and  medical  oflScer  rank- 
ing as  captain  to  each  battalion.  To  each 
division  there  is  attached  an  ambulance  com- 
pany, a  hospital  corps  and  a  division  hos- 
pital for  first  aid. 

In  action  these  work  as  one  unit.  The 
wounded  are  given  first  aid  at  an  emergency 
station  right  back  of  the  line,  then  taken  on 
stretchers  to  an  ambulance  for  transporta- 
tion to  an  advance  hospital  some  miles  behind 
the  front.  Operations  are  to  be  avoided  at 
this  hospital  unless  the  case  absolutely  de- 
mands it.  When  the  patient  is  able  to  be 
moved,  or  if  he  can  be  forwarded  without 


THE  GAS  ATTACK  167 

danger  by  postponement  of  operation,  he  is 
sent  to  the  rear  by  division  ambulance  and 
railroad  to  a  base  hospital.  These  are  far 
enough  behind  the  battle  Hne  to  be  considered 
almost  outside  the  army  zone. 

The  men  in  charge  of  these  base  hospitals  are 
the  very  cream  of  Yankee  surgeons  and  medi- 
cal men. 

They  rank  as  majors  in  the  United  States 
reserves,  with  the  title  of  directors.  Many 
of  them  have  international  reputations  as 
specialists  in  their  particular  lines.  Most  of 
these  chaps  have  abandoned  big  incomes  to 
serve  their  country  at  a  major's  pay. 

I  know  of  one  surgical  doc.  who  threw  down 
a  practice  in  New  York  which  netted  him  a 
cool  $100,000  a  year.  And  he  didn't  look  a 
bit  worried  about  it  either.  He  always  had 
a  pack  of  cigarettes  for  us  artillery  buddies, 
and  every  time  he  passed  our  dugout  he 
would  stop  and  swap  stories.  My  freckles 
used  to  amuse  him,  and  nearly  every  time  he 
saw  me  he'd  bawl  out: 

"Hey,  Reddy,  when  are  you  going  to  let 


168    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

me  graft  some  decent  white  skin  over  those 
copper  spots?" 

"Never,"  I  would  call  back. 

"Foolish  boy,"  he  would  return.  "You'd 
be  quite  a  handsome  chap  if  you  let  me  eradi- 
cate those  freckles." 

Sometimes  I  think  he  was  really  serious 
about  it,  and  wanted  to  take  a  hand  at 
experimenting  with  my  freckles.  But  he 
didn't  have  a  chance;  my  freckles  and  red 
hair  are  the  badge  of  the  fighting  de  Varilas, 
and  I  wouldn't  part  with  them  for  anything. 

The  ambulance  drivers  are  plucky  fellows; 
they  go  out  after  the  wounded  in  the  thick  of 
the  shelling.  There  was  one  chap  near  our 
lines  who  picked  up  a  soldier  who  had  one  of 
his  legs  shot  oflF  at  the  knee.  The  driver 
made  a  tourniquet  by  cutting  some  rope  oflF  a 
horse's  harness.  Then  he  placed  a  hammer 
on  the  under  side  of  the  leg  over  the  severed 
artery  and  bound  the  piece  of  harness  around 
the  leg,  tightening  it  with  an  ordinary  tire 
iron.  You  have  to  be  quick  and  resourceful, 
you  know,  when  a  man  is  bleeding  to  death. 


THE  GAS  ATTACK  169 

I  have  spoken  of  that  graveyard  right  in 
front  of  that  battery.  Well,  some  of  the 
superstitious  boys  in  our  battery  used  to  see 
all  kinds  of  things  there  at  night  when  they 
were  on  guard  duty. 

One  of  the  guards  came  into  my  dugout 
one  night  with  his  face  as  white  as  chalk; 
he  was  trembling  from  head  to  foot. 

"That  graveyard  is  haunted,"  he  said, 
"tonight  I  saw  a  ghost  out  there  as  sure  as 
you  are  a  foot  high." 

"A  ghost!"  I  hooted.  "There  are  no  such 
things  as  ghosts." 

"There  ain't,  hey.?"  he  scoffed.  "Well, 
you  ought  to  see  the  boy  I  saw." 

"What  did  he  look  like.?"  I  asked,  just  to 
kid  him  along. 

"  A  Boche  general  in  white  uniform — ^said  uni- 
form glowing  like  a  lightning  bug;  moustache 
like  the  Kaiser's,  and  steel  helmet.  And  such 
terrible  eyes;    they  looked  like  spots  of  fire." 

"Maybe  it  was  the  Kaiser,"  I  said  taunt- 
ingly, "dropped  down  from  an  aeroplane  to 
curse  the  French  dead." 


170    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"No,  it  wasn't  the  Kaiser,"  said  the  scared 
one;  "it  looked  more  like  Bismarck.  I  figure 
that  he  was  apologizing  to  the  French  dead 
for  the  inhuman  way  the  Kaiser  is  carry- 
ing on." 

Two  or  three  more  of  the  boys  got  worked 
up  over  that  graveyard,  but  in  all  the  time 
I  did  guard  duty  there,  I  never  saw  anything 
to  get  crinkly  over.  I  never  could,  figure 
why  anybody  should  be  scared  of  dead  folks, 
for  they  are  peaceful  and  never  fail  to  mind 
their  own  business,  which  cannot  be  said  of 
most  folks  who  are  alive  and  kicking. 

Right  through  January  and  February  we 
kept  potting  at  the  enemy  with  our"75's,"  and 
the  enemy  kept  potting  back  at  us.  I  always 
had  a  number  of  shells  beside  my  gun  to  be 
fired  at  a  minute's  notice. 

Many  nights  we  would  wake  up  in  our  dug- 
out with  shells  dropping  all  about  us.  We 
would  scramble  out  of  our  bunks,  race  half- 
clad  to  our  gun  pits  and  send  a  few  over  to 
the  enemy  just  to  show  him  that  we  were 
wide  awake. 


THE  GAS  ATTACK  171 

One  night  I  awakened  with  the  feeling 
that  I  was  being  tossed  about  in  the  vortex 
of  a  Kansas  cyclone.  It  was  a  trivial  inci- 
dent; a  shell  had  landed  nearby  and  blown 
the  top  off  my  dugout.  I  ran  through  the 
darkness  with  ^he  rest  of  the  crew  to  the  "75," 
and  sent  a  couple  of  shells  into  No  Man's 
Land.  Then  I  went  back  to  bed  and  slept 
like  a  top. 

The  next  day  a  German  deserter  wandered 
into  our  dugout.  I  will  tell  you  how  it 
happened.  Down  in  our  front-line  trench  a 
doughboy  observed  a  movement  in  the  dead 
grass  and  weeds  among  the  American  wire 
entanglements.  Tense  with  expectancy,  the 
doughboy  put  a  finger  against  the  trigger  of 
his  rifle  and  waited. 

The  grass  parted  and  a  yellow  dog — ^just 
plain  dog — emerged,  paused  inquiringly,  his 
forefoot  lifted  in  graceful  gesture.  Then  he 
trotted  from  Germany  into  the  United  States, 
wagging  the  signal  of  "kamarad"  with  his 
tail.  He  was  adopted  by  the  doughboys,  and 
stayed  several  days  in  the  first  line  trench. 


172    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

catching  rats  for  his  board.  Then  he  got 
sick  of  working  so  hard,  and  deserted  to  our 
battery.  He  stayed  with  us  for  about  a 
week  and  then  disappeared.  Maybe  he 
wasn't  satisfied  with  the  chow,  or  perhaps 
he  got  homesick  and  went  back  to  the  Boches. 

We  tried  to  solve  the  rat  problem  in  our 
dugouts  by  keeping  cats,  and  at  one  time  we 
had  as  many  as  ten.  But  the  cook  fed  the 
little  beasts  so  well  that  they  laid  off  the  job 
of  rat  catching,  and  would  do  nothing  but 
snooze  in  the  sun  when  they  were  not  eating. 
One  day  a  shell  landed  and  wiped  out  five  of 
the  cats,  and  the  rest  of  them  got  scared  and 
beat  it  to  parts  unknown. 

We  were  not  a  bit  sorry  to  lose  them. 

We  jumped  into  real  action  on  March  1, 
1918,  when  a  large  body  of  shock  troops, 
picked  from  the  Prussian  Guards,  went  over 
the  top,  and  charged  toward  the  American 
front  line.  The  attack  was  met  with  con- 
spicuous bravery  by  the  American  troops, 
and  there  were  many  shining  examples  of 
heroism  on  the  part  of  our  boys. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

Yankee  Heroes 

THE  attack  was  preceded  by  a  heavy 
bombardment  of  our  lines  with  large- 
caliber  guns. 

These  guns  ranged  from  the  six-  to  the 
twelve-inch  type.  The  enemy  also  let  loose 
great  quantities  of  poisonous  gas.  Heavy 
shells  and  gas  shells  fell  on  our  lines  in  a 
perfect  whirlwind  for  more  than  a  half  hour. 
A  driving  wet  snow  was  falling  and  the  visi- 
bility was  very  poor. 

The  mrnute  the  attack  opened  we  leaped 
to  our  guns  and  worked  like  devils  out  there 
in  the  storm.  My  gun  averaged  about  twenty 
shots  a  minute,  and  the  big  guns  all  along  our 
line  were  popping  like  mad.  At  the  very 
beginning  I  had  put  on  my  gas  mask,  for  the 
gas  was  coming  over  bad.  At  six  a.  m.  the 
Boche  barrage  fire  lifted  on  the  trenches  to 
the  right  of  the  salient,  and  the  Huns,  num- 

(173) 


174    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

bering  three  hundred,  came  sweeping  forward 
under  the  protection  of  their  own  fire. 

We  dropped  our  barrage  right  in  the  midst 
of  them,  and  we  yelled  with  joy  when  we  saw 
a  score  or  more  go  down.  The  rest  of  them 
jumped  into  what  was  left  of  our  first-line 
trenches.  But  instead  of  the  easy  time  antici- 
pated, the  Kaiser's  shock  troops  found  the 
Americans  all  ready  for  battle.  Fierce  hand- 
to-hand  fighting  began. 

While  the  hand-to-hand  struggle  was  going 
on,  we  kept  a  fierce  barrage  fire  sweeping 
over  No  Man's  Land.  It  caught  many  Prus- 
sians who  were  beating  it  back  to  their  own 
trenches. 

A  Boche  shell  dropped  near  my  position 
and  exploded.  I  was  thrown  a  distance  of 
ten  feet  by  the  concussion,  but  was  not 
injured.  When  the  enemy  had  been  driven 
out  of  the  positions,  the  bodies  of  ten  German 
soldiers  were  found  in  the  American  trenches. 
Two  German  ofiicers  were  entangled  in  the 
wire.  Many  bodies  were  in  sight  in  No  Man's 
Land.     Eight  were  visible  through  the  snow- 


YANKEE  HEROES  175 

storm  at  one  point.  The  ground  was  Uttered 
with  enemy  hand  grenades,  boxes  of  explosives 
for  destroying  dugouts  and  incendiary  bombs 
which  the  Boches  had  no  opportunity  to  use. 

My  battery  received  orders  to  cease  firing 
at  seven  o'clock.  We  were  a  delighted 
bunch  of  buddies  because  we  had  helped 
defeat  picked  troops  of  the  German  army. 
A  few  of  our  lads  were  wounded,  but  none 
were  killed. 

Stories  of  the  great  personal  heroism  of  the 
boys  down  in  the  first-line  trench,  while  the 
fight  was  on,  drifted  to  our  headquarters 
before  the  day  was  over.  I  will  relate  some 
of  them. 

Sergeants  Patrick  Walsh  and  William  Nor- 
ton were  in  a  dugout  when  the  Huns  landed 
in  our  first-line  trench. 

"Come  on  out,  you  American  dogs!"  yelled 
a  German  captain  through  the  door  of  the 
dugout. 

"We're  coming!"  yelled  Walsh.  He 
emerged  with  a  rush  with  a  45-caliber  auto- 
matic in  each"  hand;    he  killed  the  Boche 


176    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

captain  with  one  shot,  and  menaced  the  rest 
of  the  German  crew  with  his  pistols. 

"Come  on  out,  shall  we?"  sneered  the 
spunky  American  sergeant.  "Well,  we're 
out,  and  what  in  the  devil  are  you  going  to  do 
about  it?" 

Walsh  had  now  been  reinforced  by  Norton 
and  ten  American  soldiers,  who  had  come 
forth  from  the  dugout.  One  of  the  Boches 
treacherously  fired  a  shot  point-blank  at 
Walsh,  but  the  shot  grazed  the  right  ear  of 
the  sergeant  and  buried  itself  harmlessly  in 
a  sandbag. 

That  quick  cowardly  shot  was  just  the  thing 
needed  to  warm  good  honest  American  blood 
to  the  boiling  point,  and  the  Yankees  pitched 
into  their  foes,  unmindful  of  the  fact  that 
they  were  outnumbered  three  to  one. 

Walsh  had  a  double  incentive  for  putting 
the  best  in  him  into  that  fight,  for  in  his 
bosom  was  concealed  the  log-book  of  his 
company.  He  knew  the  Huns  would  give  a 
good  deal  to  capture  that  record,  but  he 
made  up  his  mind  that  they  would  only  take 


YANKEE  HEROES  177 

it  from  his  dead  body.  He  and  his  men  fought 
with  such  splendid  ardor  that  they  quickly 
drove  the  invaders  from  the  trench. 

But  the  Americans  enjoyed  only  a  brief 
respite.  A  force  of  fresh  German  troops  to 
the  number  of  forty  poured  into  the  salient. 
Walsh  quickly  sensed  a  fight  to  the  finish. 

"Boys,"  he  yelled,  "we've  got  to  step 
lively  now  or  we'll  wake  up  tomorrow 
morning  in  a  Boche  prison  pen." 

He  had  scarcely  finished  speaking  when  the 
Germans  bore  down  upon  the  little  American 
band,  yelling  and  firing  their  rifles. 

"Wait  until  they  get  within  ten  yards," 
counseled  Walsh,  "and  then  pump  the  lead 
into  them." 

When  the  advancing  horde  of  Boches  had 
reached  a  shell  hole  about  ten  yards  distant, 
Walsh  yelled: 

"Fire!" 

Bullets  cracked  from  Yankee  rifles,  and 
several  of  the  Huns  went  down. 

"Mix  in,  boys,  now  and  kick  hell  out  of 
'em!"    shouted    Walsh,    jumping    into    the 

12 


178    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

thick  of  the  fight  and  laying  about  him  in 
every  direction.  He  put  a  bullet  into  an 
aggressive  German,  and  cracked  the  skull  of 
another  with  the  butt  of  his  automatic.  The 
Yanks,  inspired  by  the  plucky  work  of  their 
leader,  fought  with  the  vim  and  courage  of 
American  fighters  of  old.  It  was  a  hand-to- 
hand  fracas  that  would  have  made  Israel 
Putnam,  that  fine  old  saint  of  Yankee  battle- 
dom,  chuckle  with  glee.  The  Americans 
sweated,  puffed,  swore  and  grunted  as  they 
lunged  with  knives,  swung  rifle  butts  and 
searched  for  Hunnish  windpipes  with  wiry 
fingers. 

As  for  the  Huns,  they  quickly  realized  they 
had  unwittingly  struck  into  a  very  bad 
hornet's  nest,  and  they  retreated  in  disorder, 
throwing  away  their  rifles  and  trench  knives 
in  their  haste  to  get  back  home. 

In  the  same  attack  a  big  Irish  corporal  ran 
into  two  Germans  near  a  traverse  in  the 
American  trench.  He  was  so  close  to  the 
Boches  that  he  couldn't  use  his  bayonet,  so 
he  grabbed  one  of  them  by  the  neck  and 


YANKEE  HEROES  179 

pressed  his  thumb  clean  through  the  fellow's 
windpipe,  choking  him  to  death.  The  other 
German  started  to  run,  and  the  corporal 
spitted  him  with  his  bayonet. 

An  American  private  of  small  stature 
engaged  in  a  terrific  hand-to-hand  fight 
with  a  giant  Prussian.  The  Boche  was 
as  powerful  as  a  boilermaker,  and  bent  his 
adversary  backward,  evidently  with  the  inten- 
tion of  breaking  the  spine  of  the  American 
soldier.  But  the  Yank  grabbed  a  mess  fork 
from  his  boot  leg  and  jabbed  it  into  the 
throat  of  the  Prussian,  who  died  instantly. 

When  the  raid  began.  Private  Voile  started 
to  throw  a  grenade  at  the  enemy.  The 
grenade  slipped  from  his  hand  and  fell  into 
the  bottom  of  the  trench.  Telling  his  com- 
rades to  beat  it,  he  threw  himself  upon  the 
grenade  in  the  hope  of  extinguishing  the 
fuse.  The  infernal  thing  exploded  and  Voile's 
legs  were  terribly  mangled. 

Corporal  Thomas  Cosgrove  had  his  head 
stuck  over  the  top  when  the  raid  started, 
when,    zip!    a    machine-gun    bullet     passed 


180    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

through  both  cheeks,  knocking  a  chew  of 
tobacco  out  of  his  mouth.  Cosgrove  was 
sorry  he  lost  the  chew,  but  he  was  mighty 
glad  he  had  escaped  so  easily. 

An  American  doughboy  was  buried  by  a 
shell  explosion,  only  his  feet  sticking  above 
the  earth.  On  those  feet  were  a  pair  of 
brand-new  shoes.  A  Boche  came  along, 
unlaced  the  shoes,  removed  them  and  beat 
it  across  No  Man's  Land  with  his  booty. 
When  the  doughboy  was  dug  out  by  his  com- 
rades he  was  so  enraged  at  the  loss  of  his  boots 
that  his  comrades  had  to  lay  hold  of  him  to 
keep  him  from  rushing  over  to  the  German 
trenches. 

Most  of  our  boys  who  were  wounded  were 
able  to  walk  to  the  first-aid  stations.  When 
they  arrived  there  the  surgeons  would  make 
use  of  that  famous  English  expression,  "Are 
you  downhearted?" 

And  the  doughboys  would  roar  back: 
"No,  we're  going  back  and  get  some  more  of 
those  Boche  devils." 

Sergeant  Joseph  Petrush,  of  my  battery. 


YANKEE  HEROES  181 

was  awarded  the  Croix  de  Guerre  for  con- 
spicuous bravery  during  this  engagement. 

Shells  exploded  all  around  him,  but  he 
stuck  to  his  post.  The  spokes  of  his  gun 
carriage  were  blown  away  and  his  shield  was 
riddled  with  shrapnel.  An  exploding  shell 
wrecked  his  gun  pit,  but  Petrush  didn't  quit. 
He  cleared  away  the  wreckage  with  hell 
a-poppin'  all  around  him,  and  kept  his  piece 
going  until  the  order  came  to  cease  firing. 

I  talked  with  some  of  the  German  prisoners 
taken  by  our  boys,  and  it  was  truly  amazing 
to  discover  how  they  have  been  buncoed  by 
the  military  leaders  of  Germany.  We  couldn't 
make  those  prisoners  believe  we  were  Ameri- 
cans. They  thought  that  we  were  Canadians 
and  English  dressed  up  to  look  like  Yanks. 
One  of  them  told  us  that  New  York  had  been 
captured  many  months  before  by  the  German 
fleet,  and  that  every  transport  that  had  left 
the  States  had  been  sunk  by  Boche  sub- 
marines. We  had  an  awful  hard  time  con- 
vincing them  that  we  were  real  honest-to- 
goodness  Yankees. 


182    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

The  German  oflScers  tell  their  men  that 
they  will  be  subjected  to  all  kinds  of  abuse 
by  the  Allies  if  they  are  captured.  One  of 
the  prisoners  who  was  sent  to  the  hospital 
because  of  wounds  wouldn't  eat  any  food 
until  it  first  had  been  tasted  by  a  nurse.  He 
was  certain  that  poison  had  been  placed  in 
his  chow. 

A  map  found  on  one  of  the  Germans 
showed  how  completely  the  Huns  prepare 
their  raids.  The  map  showed  every  machine- 
gun  emplacement,  every  trench  and  every 
depression  in  the  ground  within  the  Ameri- 
can lines. 

That  raid  made  us  so  mad  that  we  decided 
to  strike  back  at  the  Huns,  and  we  did  a  few 
days  later. 


\  CHAPTER  XVin 

The  American  Raid 

WE  determined  to  do  a  little  raiding 
ourselves  and  laid  our  plans  with 
great  care. 

Both  the  artillery  and  the  infantry  prac- 
ticed for  four  days  so  as  to  insure  the  success 
of  the  attack. 

It  was  planned  to  have  the  engineers  place 
tubes  containing  explosives  under  the  German 
barbed  wire,  and  at  the  "zero"  hour  these 
tubes  were  to  be  exploded  so  that  a  passage 
would  be  made  through  the  entanglements 
for  our  men. 

On  the  evening  of  March  5th  we  were 
given  our  instructions  and  ordered  to  our 
posts.  At  one  o'clock  in  the  morning,  the 
time  selected  for  the  zero  hour,  all  the  batteries 
on  our  line  began  plugging  shells  into  the 
German  trenches.  The  sky  was  lighted 
intermittently  for  miles  around  by  the  flare 

(183) 


184    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

of  our  guns,  and  during  the  lulls  in  the  firing 
of  the  big  guns  we  could  hear  the  popping  of 
the  machine  guns  in  our  front-line  trenches. 

The  Boches  were  greatly  alarmed,  for  they 
sent  up  hundreds  of  star  shells  in  an  effort 
to  keep  No  Man's  Land  well  illuminated. 
It  was  planned  to  have  the  barrage  last  for 
forty-five  minutes,  after  which  our  boys 
were  to  go  over  the  top  and  charge  into  the 
German  first-line  trench,  but  when  ten 
minutes  had  passed  we  were  ordered  to  cease 
firing. 

We  gunners  yelped  with  disappointment 
and  wondered  what  in  blazes  had  happened. 

We  found  out  soon  enough;  the  engineers 
had  failed  to  blow  up  the  Boche  barbed  wire 
and  our  lads  couldn't  get  into  the  German 
lines.  The  raid  was  a  fizzle,  but  the  failure 
only  whetted  our  appetites  for  another  poke 
at  the  Hun. 

We  made  another  try  on  the  night  of 
March  7th,  and  it  worked  fine  that  time.  We 
dropped  tons  of  shells  into  the  German  front 
line,  virtually  obliterating  the  trench.      Our 


\THE  AMERICAN  RAID  185 

men  walked  over  nicely  behind  their  barrage, 
and  penetrated  to  the  German  second  line. 

Raiding  began  to  be  a  habit  with  us  after 
that  and  it  was  encouraging  to  hear  how 
well  our  infantry  boys  matched  up  to  the 
enemy. 

Sergeant  Eugene  McNiff,  twenty-two  years 
old,  and  Corporal  Milo  Plant,  twenty  years 
old,  both  of  the  famous  old  165th  New  York 
Regiment,  participated  in  one  of  the  most 
important  raids  early  in  March.  Before  his 
enlistment  McNiff  was  employed  in  a  muni- 
tion factory  and  Plant  was  a  vaudeville  piano 
player.  After  taking  part  in  a  raid,  these 
two  young  men  made  three  trips  into  the 
shell-swept  wastes  of  No  Man's  Land  and 
brought  in  the  wounded.  They  were  awarded 
the  Croix  de  Guerre  for  their  bravery. 

The  commanding  oflScer  called  for  volun- 
teers to  take  part  in  the  raiding  expedition 
which  was  designed  to  bring  back  German 
prisoners  and  force  information  from  them 
concerning  the  strength  of  the  units  opposite 
the  American  trenches.      Every  one  of  the 


186    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

165th  volunteered,  as  was  to  be  expected,  but 
only  forty  were  chosen.  McNiflF  was  selected 
from  C  Company  and  Plant  from  D  Company, 
the  latter  being  in  command  of  Captain  James 
McKenna,  famous  athlete  and  lawyer,  of 
New  York  City. 

These  forty,  with  two  officers  and  fifty 
French  privates,  went  to  a  spot  ten  miles 
behind  the  front  lines,  and  for  two  weeks  were 
intensively  trained  for  the  raid  until  every 
man  knew  his  part  perfectly. 

When  the  night  of  the  raid  came,  the  boys 
could  hardly  to  restrained,  so  eager  were  they 
to  get  at  the  enemy. 

Corporal  Plant,  who  was  one  of  the 
Pershing  heroes  sent  to  America  to  aid  in  the 
Liberty  Loan  drive,  gave  me  a  thrilling 
description  of  the  raid,  and  I  will  let  him 
tell  it  again: 

"The  zero  hour  came  at  7.37  p.  m.,"  he  told 
me.  "Two  hundred  light  and  heavy  pieces 
of  artillery  and  two  hundred  machine  guns 
opened  up  on  a  space  of  one  hundred  yards. 
Our  batteries  certainly  gave  us  a  fine  barrage. 


THE  AMERICAN  RAID  187 

"We  went  over  the  top  at  7.40,  and  imme- 
diately star  shells  began  to  shoot  from  Fritz's 
side,  two  hundred  yards  away.  I  don't  know 
how  long  it  took  us  to  get  over  to  Fritz's 
bailiwick,  but  we  certainly  did  hop  it. 

"The  damage  to  the  German  trenches  was 
something  awful.  They  were  all  torn  to 
pieces.  Sixteen-foot  holes  were  hollowed  out 
by  our  shells.  The  holes  were  eight  feet 
wide.  There  was  groaning  and  cursing  all 
around  us  by  wounded  Germans. 

"The  Germans  put  a  barrage  right  on  their 
own  front-line  trenches  as  soon  as  we  got  there. 
We  found  out  later  that  about  four  hundred 
men  had  occupied  the  terrain  we  invaded. 
About  three  hundred  of  these  men  were  killed 
by  our  barrage.  Most  of  them  were  half 
buried  in  the  ground.  Bits  of  torn  flesh  and 
blood  covered  everything. 

"The  Huns  kept  sending  up  star  shell  after 
star  shell,  and  it  was  as  light  as  day.  Sergeant 
McNiff  and>I  fought  side  by  side.  We  kept 
emptying  our  automatics  into  the  struggling 
mass  of  men,  who  tried  to  organize  them- 


188    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

selves  into  some  sort  of  a  defensive  fighting 
unit. 

"About  fifty  of  the  Germans  had  run  away 
and  there  was  about  an  equal  number  left  to 
oppose  us.  These  were  reinforced  by  Prus- 
sian guardsmen,  big  husky  fellows  who  have 
the  reputation  of  fighting  until  they  are 
killed. 

"The  rescuing  party  must  have  come  up 
right  through  their  own  barrage,  and  right 
here  I  want  to  say  that  it  is  typical  of  the 
Germans  to  do  what  those  men  did  that  night. 
Their  gunners  never  slackened  up  on  the 
front-line  trenches,  though  they  knew  that 
their  own  men  were  'clicking  it'  (dying)  with 
every  round  fired. 

"We  had  intended  to  stay  in  No  Man's 
Land  and  in  the  German  trenches  only  long 
enough  to  get  prisoners,  but  the  barrage  that 
the  enemy  put  down  was  so  hot  and  kept  up 
so  long  that  it  was  five  hours  and  a  half  after 
the  time  we  went  over  the  top  before  we  got 
back  in  our  own  dugouts.  During  that  time 
we  crept  from  shell  hole  to  shell  hole  and 


THE  AMERICAN  RAID  189 

gained  what  little  protection  we  could  from 
the  craters. 

"I  suppose  our  entire  stay  in  the  trenches 
wasn't  more  than  ten  minutes.  Four  of  our 
men  were  killed  and  two  were  wounded  in  the 
encounter. 

"We  were  all  pretty  mad  during  those 
hours  we  waited  out  in  the  shell  craters  for 
the  barrage  to  stop,  because  we  hadn't  brought 
any  prisoners  back  with  us. 

"When  we  landed  back  at  one  a.  m.  the  lieu- 
tenant called  for  volunteers  to  go  back  and 
get  the  wounded.  Sergeant  McNiflf  and  I 
volunteered  to  go,  and  we  made  three  trips 
at  three,  five  and  six  o'clock,  respectively. 
In  bringing  the  wounded  back  we  had  to  carry 
them  from  shell  hole  to  shell  hole  to  avoid  the 
murderous  fire  of  the  Huns." 


CHAPTER  XIX 
French  War  Crosses 

THE  Croix  de  Guerre,  a  badge  of  honor 
which  only  the  highest  heroism  wins, 
was  awarded  by  the  French  govern- 
ment to  many  Americans  during  March,  1918. 
Some  of  the  winners  were  my  buddies,  and  I 
knew  first-hand  of  the  deeds  of  bravery  which 
won  for  them  the  greatest  military  honor  of 
the  French  Republic.  And  every  one  of  them 
deserved  to  have  the  little  medal  pinned  on 
their  breasts,  for  they  had  acquitted  them- 
selves with  a  courage  that  has  burnished  anew 
the  sacred  battle  traditions  of  the  United 
States. 

The  conferring  of  the  decorations  was 
accompanied  by  an  impressive  ceremony. 
The  lucky  Yanks  picked  to  get  war  crosses 
were  lined  up  with  a  number  of  French 
soldiers,  who  were  selected  for  the  same 
honor. 

(190) 


FRENCH  WAR  CROSSES  191 

A  French  military  band  blared  away  at 
"The  Star  Spangled  Banner,"  and  when  it 
ceased  playing,  an  American  band  returned 
the  compliment  with  the  "Marseillaise." 

Then  a  distinguished  looking  French  gen- 
eral, resplendent  in  dress  uniform,  went  down 
the  line,  pinning  the  decorations  to  the  breasts 
of  the  American  and  French  heroes.  After 
he  had  completed  the  work  of  pinning  a 
medal  on  an  uncomfortable  looking  hero, 
the  general,  after  the  French  custom,  would 
kiss  the  recipient  of  the  honor  on  both  cheeks. 

I  sort  of  filled  up  and  choked  with  feeling 
every  time  I  saw  the  general  put  one  of  the 
badges  on  a  Yank.  I  felt  proud  of  them  and 
proud  that  I  was  one  of  their  countrymen. 
I  remember  fervently  wishing  that  George 
Washington,  John  Paul  Jones,  Stephen 
Decatur,  Abe  Lincoln,  General  Grant,  and 
all  the  rest  of  America's  old-time  heroes  and 
patriots  could  be  present  and  see  how  America 
is  keeping  up  the  old  Yankee  traditions  in  the 
present  war.  Honest,  the  way  I  felt  then,  I 
believe  that  I  could  have  overcome  my  aver- 


192    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

sion  to  being  kissed  by  a  Frenchman  if  the 
general  had  walked  toward  me  and  tried  to 
pin  one  of  those  badges  on  my  coat.  I  know  a 
lot  of  my  buddies  felt  the  same  way  about  it. 

One  of  the  boys  who  landed  a  war  cross 
was  Private  Homer  Whited,  of  Bessemer, 
Ala,  He  came  back  with  me  to  America  to 
help  boost  the  third  Liberty  Loan,  so  I  know 
all  about  the  stunt  that  made  him  a  hero. 
It  was  his  pluck  that  checkmated  what  might 
have  been  a  disastrous  raid  on  a  sector  of  the 
American  trenches  on  the  Lorraine  front,  the 
night  of  March  5,  1918. 

Whited  and  three  companions  were  attacked 
by  a  force  of  Huns  six  times  their  number, 
but  the  Americans  routed  the  Germans  after 
killing  nine  and  taking  two  prisoners. 

Homer  is  a  modest  little  doughboy,  and  I 
had  a  hard  time  pulling  the  yarn  out  of  him, 
but  at  length  I  got  it,  and  here  it  is  in  his  own 
language: 

"We  landed  in  the  front-line  trenches  at 
Ancerville,  on  the  Lorraine  front,  February 
17,   1918.      On  the  evening  of  March  5th, 


FRENCH  WAR  CROSSES  193 

snow  fell,  covering  the  ground  to  a  depth  of 
four  inches. 

"It  was  cold  and  disagreeable,  and  when 
three  fellows  from  my  state  came  to  my  dug- 
out and  asked  me  to  go  along  with  them,  I 
was  none  too  merry  about  it. 

"The  men  were  Sergeant  West,  and  Cor- 
porals Edward  Freeman  and  Amos  Tesky. 
They  told  me  they  had  a  liaison  message  to 
carry  from  one  sector  to  another,  and  were 
crazy  for  company. 

"They  kidded  me  about  my  disposition 
until  I  crawled  out  of  the  dugout  and  went 
along  with  them. 

"We  had  to  pass  through  five  gates  between 
the  point  we  had  left  to  the  point  we  were 
seeking,  and  as  we  went  through  the  last  of 
them.  Sergeant  West  ordered  me  to  return  for 
some  hand  grenades.  I  misunderstood  the 
order,  and  thought  he  said:  'See  if  there  is 
any  one  between  us  and  the  gate.'  When 
I  reported  and  he  found  out  the  mistake  I  had 
made,  he  insisted  that  I  go  back  and  get  the 
grenades  anyway. 


194    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"It  was  a  mighty  good  thing  he  did,  as 
later  events  showed,  although  at  the  time  we 
had  not  the  slightest  thought  of  meeting  any 
of  the  enemy. 

"I  soon  returned  with  the  grenades,  and 
we  resumed  our  journey.  At  a  traverse,  we 
thought  we  heard  voices,  and  Sergeant  West 
challenged.     Receiving  no  answer,  he  fired. 

"In  the  flash  we  saw  that  a  party  of 
Germans,  six  times  as  large  as  our  own,  was 
upon  us. 

"  'Give  them  the  grenades,  Homer!'  yelled 
West. 

"I  gave  them  the  grenades,  all  right,  and 
the  next  minute,  two  big  Germans  were 
running  toward  me  with  their  hands  up, 
yelling  'kamarad.' 

"I  shoved  them  behind  me  as  I  saw  five 
more  coming  over  the  top  of  the  ridge.  I 
emptied  five  cartridges  into  them,  and  they 
came  no  further. 

"Just  then  I  happened  to  turn,  and  saw 
one  of  my  prisoners  preparing  to  leap  upon 
my  back.     He  knew  my  gun  was  empty,  and 


FRENCH  WAR  CROSSES  195 

thought  it  would  be  easy  for  him  to  clean  me 
up.  There  was  nothing  to  do  but  give  him 
the  butt,  and  he  got  that  until  he  couldn't 
yell  'kamarad'  any  more. 

"When  the  little  tea  party  was  over,  there 
were  nine  dead  Germans,  and  we  were  able 
to  get  back  with  two  prisoners.  They  told 
our  oflScers  of  the  Forty-second  Division  that 
a  party  of  two  hundred  Huns  were  preparing 
to  raid  our  sector  that  night.  We  got  ready 
for  them,  but  they  never  came." 

Equally  as  thrilling  is  the  story  of  Corporal 
Raymond  Guyette,  another  war  cross  win- 
ner. The  corporal  is  a  soft-spoken  little  chap, 
and  before  he  got  into  the  war  was  a  clerk  in 
the  American  Brass  Company's  plant  at 
Waterbury,  Conn. 

Orders  came  to  capture  two  German 
prisoners  from  a  certain  sector  near  the  Yser 
Canal  and  the  Chemin  des  Dames  on  March 
18,  1918.  Thirty-five  Yanks,  including 
Guyette,  and  one  hundred  and  ten  French- 
men volunteered.  / 

Twelve  American  engineers  from  the  101st 


196    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

went  out  across  No  Man's  Land  ahead  of  the 
raiding  party  with  pontoon  bridges  to  throw 
across  the  canal.  The  German  trenches 
were  on  the  other  side  of  the  canal. 

The  zero  hour  of  the  raiders  was  at  5.15, 
when  the  American  barrage  started.  But, 
unfortunately,  the  French  guides  led  the 
raiders  too  far  by  a  couple  of  hundred  yards, 
and  the  raiding  party  blundered  right  into 
the  midst  of  their  own  artillery  fire.  Of  the 
twelve  engineers,  five  were  killed  and  the 
remaining  seven  were  wounded. 

To  make  matters  worse,  the  Germans  laid 
down  a  barrage,  behind  which  their  infantry 
advanced  upon  the  Americans  and  French. 
Shells  were  falling  everywhere — our  own 
and  Fritz's — and  rifles  and  machine  guns  were 
blazing  away  merrily. 

There  were  a  good  many  gas  shells  mixed 
up  in  the  German  firing,  and  a  lot  of  our  boys 
got  slight  doses  of  the  poisonous  stuff. 
Thirteen  Americans  were  wounded,  including 
Guyette;  a  number  of  the  French  were  hit  too. 

As  Guyette,  suffering  from  his  wound,  was 


FRENCH  WAR  CROSSES  197 

limping  back  to  our  lines,  which  were  about 
three  hundred  yards  from  the  canal,  he  heard 
a  call  for  help.  It  was  one  of  the  wounded 
engineers.  Guyette  went  back  and  slung  the 
man  over  his  shoulder.  While  he  was  doing 
this  he  noticed  there  were  other  wounded  men 
lying  close  by.  When  he  had  landed  the 
first  man  safely  in  our  trenches  he  was  pretty 
well  exhausted,  but  he  had  strength  enough 
to  bring  another  man  in,  so  he  started  back. 
He  packed  the  second  man  on  his  back  and 
got  back  with  him  all  right.  Then  this 
gritty  young  chap  from  Connecticut  went 
back  a  third  time,  and  brought  in  a  third 
man.  All  this  time,  it  must  be  remembered 
the  No  Man's  Land  was  being  raked  with  a 
terrific  fire  by  the  Germans.  If  Corporal 
Guyette  didn't  deserve  a  war  cross,  then 
nobody  ever  did.  His  brave  deed  or  deeds 
ought  to  stir  the  blood  of  every  American. 
Guyette  came  back  with  the  Liberty  Loan 
hero  outfit,  and  every  time  I  hear  his  name 
mentioned  I  feel  like  cheering  and  tossing 
up  my  hat. 


198    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

A  number  of  boys  of  the  Ohio  infantry 
received  war  crosses  while  I  was  in  France. 
One  of  these  was  Sergeant  Ethridge  Justice. 
When  the  whole  team  of  one  of  the  37-miUi- 
metre  guns  was  disabled  this  spunky  chap 
continued  to  fire  it,  at  the  same  time  keeping 
command  of  the  other  guns.  Another  Ohio 
boy.  Private  Charles  Cain,  of  the  infantry, 
was  wounded  on  March  9th,  but  continued  to 
load  his  piece  until  his  strength  was  exhausted. 

Corporal  H.  W.  Fanning,  of  Maryland,  was 
commended  for  throwing  himself  upon  a 
bomb  on  a  parapet  and  preventing  its  falling 
into  a  trench,  averting  a  serious  accident. 
Private  B.  J.  Block,  of  Alabama,  was  cited 
for  pulling  the  igniter  from  a  gun  to  prevent 
firing  when  the  shot  would  have  probably 
killed  a  comrade  engaged  in  the  rescuing  of 
the  wounded. 

The  manner  in  which  Private  John  McCor- 
mack,  of  the  165th,  traveled  over  a  shell- 
swept  area  to  obtain  food  for  his  weary  com- 
rades fighting  in  a  front-line  trench,  furnishes 
one  of  the  thrillers  of  the  war.     McCormack 


FRENCH  WAR  CROSSES  199 

didn't  get  a  war  cross,  but  he  deserves  one 
for  the  way  he  conducted  himself. 

He  gave  up  a  good  job  as  a  keeper  in  Sing 
Sing  prison  to  answer  the  call  that  stirred  his 
Irish  blood.-  His  experience  is  sufficient  to 
thrill  all  Americans  who  are  proud  of  their 
fighting  men.  He  is  a  big  blue-eyed  boy  with 
muscles  as  strong  as  steel.  I  heard  him  spin 
his  yarn  when  he  came  back  with  us  to 
America. 

"We  went  into  the  Lorraine  sector,"  he 
said,  "on  the  night  of  March  7th.  There 
hadn't  been  any  heavy  firing  there  for  two 
years,  the  French  fellows  told  us  as  they  came 
out.     They  said  it  was  as  safe  as  a  church. 

"Well,  we  hadn't  been  there  four  hours 
before  Fritz  let  go  at  us  with  everything  he 
had.  There  was  only  one  line  of  trench 
there,  so  there  was  nothing  for  us  to  do  but 
get  down  into  our  dugouts.  There  wasn't 
any  communicating  trench  through  which 
we  could  retreat  to  our  rear  lines.  We  just 
had  to  hold  tight  and  take  our  medicine. 

"I  was  in  a  deep  dugout  with  twenty-two 


200    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

men  and  a  couple  of  officers,  when  a  heavy 
*minnenwerfer'  smacked  on  top  of  it,  and 
buried  us  all  underneath  tons  of  earth.  I 
was  covered  with  earth  and  debris  up  to  my 
neck,  and  it  was  an  hour  before  I  was  able  to 
make  the  least  movement  toward  digging  my 
way  out. 

"There  were  a  few  groans  to  be  heard,  but 
mostly  it  was  silent  in  the  wrecked  dugout. 
And  no  wonder,  for  of  the  original  twenty-two, 
only  three  of  us  remained  alive. 

"Finally  I  worked  myself  free,  and  found 
the  other  two  boys  who  were  alive.  We  were 
all  hurt,  but  were  strong  enough  to  try  to  dig 
our  way  up  to  the  surface. 

"This  is  how  we  did  it:  One  man  would  dig 
away  earth  with  his  steel  helmet,  then  pass  it 
to  the  second  fellow,  who  stood  half  way  up 
to  the  steps,  leading  to  the  surface.  The 
second  would  pass  the  hat  to  the  third,  who 
would  chuck  the  dirt  out  of  a  little  opening  at 
the  surface,  through  which  we  were  getting 
air. 

"Corporal  Helmar  and  Corporal  Raymond 


FRENCH  WAR  CROSSES  201 

were  the  other  two  fellows  with  me.  It  took 
us  four  hours  and  a  half  to  dig  our  way  out. 

"The  bombardment,  which  started  at  11.30 
at  night,  lasted  through  until  the  next  day. 
And  this  was  the  sector  they  said  was  safe 
as  church. 

"When  we  finally  got  above  ground  we  were 
cut  oflF  by  a  couple  of  hundred  yards  from 
the  next  sector  of  the  trench  that  remained 
intact,  but  we  had  to  get  over  there  somehow, 
so  we  took  it  on  the  run,  through  a  rain  of  all 
sorts  of  shells.    We  made  it  all  right. 

"All  day  we  stayed  in  this  place  (the  boys 
were  getting  a  strafing  too)  without  any 
grub.  In  the  afternoon  somebody  said: 
*  Who'll  volunteer  to  go  back  to  the  second- 
line  trenches  and  bring  some  chow  out  here.^' 

"I  was  pretty  hungry,  so  I  said  I  would 

go. 

"There  was  no  communicating  trenches 
and  I  knew  it  was  up  to  me  to  beat  it  back 
over  the  open  country. 

"I  will  confess  that  the  prospect  didn't 
appear  very  joyful  to  me,  but  when  a  man  is 


202    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

half  starved  he  becomes  desperate.  So  I 
started  across. 

"The  whole  German  army  started  banging 
at  me  and  I  had  to  duck  into  a  shell  hole. 

"There,  hungry  as  I  was,  I  had  to  stick  for 
two  hours  until  Fritz  let  up  a  bit.  When 
there  was  a  lull  I  started  on  again. 

"When  I  arrived  where  the  mess  outfit  was 
located,  I  needed  help  to  carry  the  chow  back 
to  the  boys  at  the  front.  Lieutenant  Ellett 
and  Private  McCarthy  felt  sorry  for  the 
hungry  lads,  and  they  said  they'd  go  along 
with  me. 

"We  each  grabbed  two  big  tins  of  red-hot 
stew,  thick  with  meat  and  vegetables,  and  oflf 
we  went. 

"We  got  there  all  right,  after  a  few  stops  at 
the  way  stations  (the  shell  holes)  and  believe 
me,  those  twenty-three  lads  in  the  first-line 
trench  were  mighty  glad  to  get  the  chow. 
But  I'll  tell  you  that  was  the  hardest  dinner 
I  ever  rustled  for  in  my  life." 

These  are  the  types  of  lads  America  is 
sending  against  the  Hun,  and  in  view  of  this 


FRENCH  WAR  CROSSES  208 

fact,  I  am  certain  that  the  Kaiser  has  no  more 
chance  of  winning  this  war  than  Charley 
Chaplin  has  of  becoming  the  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury. 


CHAPTER  XX 
Back  to  the  U.  S.  A. 

ONE  night  we  noticed  a  series  of  light 
flashes  at  a  point  about  a  mile  behind 
our  battery  position. 

Immediately  after  the  flashes  ceased  one  of 
the  Boche  batteries  began  a  terriflc  bombard- 
ment, sending  shells  screaming  to  a  spot  in 
our  rear. 

Our  suspicions  were  aroused  after  this 
thing  had  occurred  two  or  three  times,  and 
they  were  verified  the  next  night  when  some 
French  soldiers  bagged  a  German  spy  over 
back  of  us  in  the  wood.  The  spy  was  a  mere 
boy,  and  how  he  got  back  of  our  lines  nobody 
knows. 

From  a  tree-top  this  boy  had  been  sending 
flashlight  signals  to  the  German  lines,  giving 
information  when  ammunition  trains  reached 
a  certain  cross-road.  The  Boche  batteries 
shelled  the  cross-roads  at  the  proper  moment, 

(204) 


BACK  TO  THE  U.  S.  A.  205 

with  the  result  that  several  motor  trucks  were 
blown  up  and  a  number  of  men  killed. 

Our  boys  have  to  keep  a  keen  watch  every 
minute  for  German  spies.  They  smuggle 
themselves  in  behind  our  lines  through  all 
sorts  of  avenues.  They  employ  all  kinds  of 
trickery  to  gain  their  ends.  Some  of  them 
land  behind  the  American  and  French  lines  in 
aeroplanes.  They  are  disguised  in  American 
and  French  uniforms. 

Some  of  them  hang  around  staff  head- 
quarters trying  to  sneak  information  while 
others  go  boldly  into  the  trenches  and  mingle 
with  the  oflScers  and  men.  I  heard  of  one 
case  where  a  spy  in  the  uniform  of  a  Yankee 
lieutenant  appeared  one  night  in  an  American 
trench,  and  said  to  the  captain: 

"We  are  to  fall  back  at  once  to  the  second 
line." 

The  faintest  of  accents  in  the  fellow's 
speech  aroused  the  captain's  suspicions,  and 
he  turned  his  flashlight  into  the  face  of  the 
speaker.  The  little  circle  of  tell-tale  light 
revealed    the   Teutonic   cast   of   the    man's 


206    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

features,  and  the  Yank  leaped  at  his  throat 
and  bore  him  to  the  ground.  The  spy  was 
hustled  to  the  rear  under  heavy  guard. 

That  incident  showed  that  the  Huns  have 
got  to  get  up  early  in  the  morning  to  fool  the 
Yanks.  We  are  all  from  Missouri  and  have 
to  be  shown. 

In  March,  1918,  an  American  battery  to 
the  right  of  us  in  the  woods  was  subjected  to 
a  terrific  gas  attack.  This  battery  was  in 
charge  of  Lieutenant  Hirsch,  of  Philadelphia. 
The  outfit  was  under  fire  from  gas  shells  for 
four  days,  and  as  it  is  impossible  for  men  to 
keep  their  masks  on  for  that  length  of  time, 
every  man-jack  in  the  battery  was  gassed. 
Lieutenant  Hirsch  refused  to  leave  the  battery 
until  the  last  man  had  succumbed,  and  then 
he  was  so  badly  blinded  that  he  had  to  be 
led  away. 

Every  clear  day  our  airmen  would  go  up 
and  meet  the  enemy.  When  we  first  moved 
into  our  sector  the  Huns  were  slightly  our 
superior  in  the  matter  of  machines,  but  not 
for  long.    The  French  came  to  our  rescue  and 


BACK  TO  THE  U.  S.  A.  207 

loaned  us  some  planes,  and  in  short  order  the 
United  States  took  over  the  control  of  the 
air.     The  Americans  have  proved  themselves 
to   be   the   most   daring   and   resourceful   of 
aviators.      They    excel  even  the    dare-devil 
French  fliers.     One  day  I  saw  an  American 
aviator  dive  down  three  thousand  feet  into 
a  nest  of  Boche  planes,  forcing  one  to  the 
ground,  and  compelling  the  remainder  to  flee. 
The  exploits  of  American  aviators  were  the 
topic  of  daily  conversation  in  our  battery. 
One  of  our  fliers  was  scouting  fifteen  miles 
back  of  the  Boche  lines  when  engine  trouble 
obliged  him  to  alight  in  the  enemy's  country. 
He  repaired  the  engine  without  any  trouble, 
but  discovered  to  his  dismay  that  he  had  not 
enough  gasoline   to  get  back  to  his  hangar. 
It  was  a  desperate  situation,  but  the  Yank 
was  not  discouraged.     He  hid  his  machine  in 
a  clump  of  woods  and,  taking  a  brass  con- 
tainer, started  foraging  for  oil.     He  located 
an  enemy  hangar  near  a  farm  house,  and,  as 
luck  would  have  it,  the  place  was  unguarded. 
He  had  just  finished  filling  his  container  with 


208    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

oil  when  a  car  filled  with  German  ofiicers 
^hizzed  around  a  bend  in  the  road.  The 
Yank  jumped  through  an  open  window  of  the 
farm  house,  ran  upstairs  and  hid  under  a 
bed.  By  the  sounds  the  American  soon  con- 
cluded that  he  had  butted  into  the  very 
thick  of  a  German  staff  headquarters  meeting. 
There  was  nothing  for  him  to  do  but  remain 
under  the  bed  until  things  had  quieted  down. 

In  about  an  hour  two  Hun  oflBcers,  dusty 
from  travel  and  apparently  dog-tired  from 
the  stress  of  battle,  lumbered  into  the  room, 
and  after  many  German  curses  and  much 
imbibing  from  a  suspicious-looking  black 
bottle,  tumbled  into  bed  with  grunts  and 
groans  of  weariness.  They  were  quickly  fast 
asleep,  their  snores  sounding  like  French 
barrage  fire. 

The  Yankee  airman  crept  from  under  the 
bed  and,  clinging  tightly  to  the  container, 
he  softly  opened  the  door  and  reached  the 
top  of  the  stairway,  only  to  run  plump  into  a 
fat  German  officer  coming  up. 

The  Hun  let  loose  a  wolfish  grunt  and  his 


BACK  TO  THE  U.  S.  A.  209 

big  watery  eyes  threatened  to  pop  from  his 
fat  face.  Down  came  the  container  on  the 
top  of  his  head,  and  the  Teuton  crashed  back- 
ward down  the  stairway.  But  three  or  four 
Huns  had  rushed  into  the  lower  hallway,  and 
with  fierce  cries  they  started  up  the  stairs. 
The  Yank  dealt  with  them  in  a  typical  breezy 
American  fashion. 

From  the  top  of  the  stairs  he  leaped  into 
their  midst,  dealing  blows  to  the  right  and 
the  left  with  his  container.  There  was  a 
cork  fastened  securely  in  the  top  so  that  not 
a  drop  of  the  precious  oil  was  spilled.  The 
Germans  went  down  as  if  they  had  been 
felled  with  an  ax.  The  Yank  darted  out  of 
the  house  and  sprinted  to  the  hiding  place  of 
his  plane.  He  replenished  the  exhausted 
tank  and  a  few  minutes  later  was  2,000  feet 
aloft,  heading  for  the  French  lines,  where  he 
landed  in  safety. 

Our  aviators  are  doing  excellent  work 
mapping  the  enemy's  country,  bombing 
trenches  and  blowing  up  munition  dumps, 
railroad  stations  and  lines  of  communication. 

14 


210    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

Well,  I  got  mine,  the  latter  part  of  March, 
1918.  TWiile  under  fire  my  mask  was  cut  by 
a  piece  of  shrapnel,  and  I  got  my  first  bad 
dose  of  gas.  It  was  mustard  gas  too,  one  of 
the  worst  kind  the  devilish  Boches  send  over. 
I  was  pumping  away  at  my  gun,  when  sud- 
denly I  felt  a  choking,  stinging  sensation, 
and  then  I  passed  out  like  a  baby  hit  with  a 
brick.  TVTien  I  came  to  I  was  in  the  hospital 
with  nurses  fluttering  all  about  doing  kind 
things.  But  I  couldn't  see  them,  for  I  was  as 
blind  as  a  bat. 

When  I  discovered  there  was  something  the 
matter  with  my  eyes  I  was  so  mad  I  almost 
foamed  at  the  mouth. 

"I'm  going  to  get  a  Boche  right  now,"  I 
yelled,  "if  I  have  to  crawl  to  the  front." 

And,  clad  only  in  my  night-shirt,  I  rolled 
out  of  my  cot  and  charged  at  the  spot  where  I 
figured  a  door  might  be  located. 

I  plunged  into  a  convalescent  soldier,  and 
we  both  went  to  the  floor  biting  and  scratching. 

I  must  have  been  a  little  delirious,  for  I 
fixed  such  a  tight  grip  on  his  windpipe  that 


BACK  TO  THE  U.  S.  A.  211 

it  required  the  combined  efforts  of  four 
nurses  and  an  attendant  to  pry  me  loose. 
I  must  have  thought  the  poor  chap  I  knocked 
down  was  a  Boche. 

The  next  day  I  was  all  right  in  my  noodle, 
but  I  was  still  blind  and  mad  as  the  devil. 

I  was  a  little  consoled  that  afternoon  when 
some  Irish  lads  from  a  famous  New  York 
regiment  were  brought  in.  They  were  in 
worse  shape  than  I  was,  suffering  from  both 
gas  and  wounds,  but  they  were  as  game  as 
bulldogs.  They  cursed  the  Huns  with  all 
of  the  variations  of  the  Gaelic  temperament. 
Their  Irish  blood  was  to  the  boiling  point, 
and  their  chief  desire  was  to  get  back  to  the 
front  double-quick  and  get  another  crack  at 
the  Hun.  Never  have  I  heard  men  swear 
with  such  picturesqueness.  If  they  ever 
get  a  chance  to  do  all  the  things  they  threat- 
ened to  do  to  the  Kaiser,  there  won't  be  so 
much  as  a  toenail  left  of  his  royal  highness 
for  purposes  of  identification. 

One  of  the  lads  who  had  lost  a  leg  was  par- 
ticularly vitriolic. 


212    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

"So  help  me,"  he  said,  "I'm  going  back  if 
I  have  to  carve  me  own  wooden  leg  out  of  a 
bedpost.  And  that  blankety  blank  German 
Emperor,  may  the  devil  get  him,  for  if  he 
don't  I  will." 

At  the  end  of  the  sixth  day  I  regained  my 
eyesight,  and  was  a  happy  lad  to  be  able  to 
see  the  world  once  more. 

I  remained  in  the  hospital  two  weeks  and 
was  then  sent  to  a  casualty  camp.  While 
there  doing  light  duty,  I  was  picked  with 
thirteen  others  of  the  First  Division  to  return 
to  the  States  and  help  out  in  the  third  Liberty 
Loan  Campaign.  Thirty-seven  others  from 
various  branches  of  General  Pershing's  over- 
seas forces  were  also  selected  to  go  back.  In 
this  Liberty  Loan  contingent  were  artillery- 
men, infantrymen,  machine  gunners  and  sig- 
nal corps  men,  representing  every  section  of 
the  United  States  from  New  York  to  San 
Francisco. 

One  of  the  lucky  lads.  Private  Langhorne 
Barbour,  seventeen  years  old,  of  Chatham, 
Va.,  was  in  that  vicious  fight  on  the  Swiss 


BACK  TO  THE  U.  S.  A.  213 

border,  November  2,  1917,  when  the  Germans 
box-barraged  a  tiny  sector  and  killed  that 
trio  of  American  soldiers  whose  names  will 
go  down  in  history  as  the  earliest  martyrs 
of  the  war — Enright,  Gresham  and  Hay. 

I  was  picked  to  go  because  I  had  fired  the 
first  shot  for  Uncle  Sam  in  the  war,  but  when 
I  was  told  I  was  going  back  to  the  good  old 
U.  S.  A.  to  boom  the  bonds,  I  couldn't  believe 
it  until  I  was  actually  aboard  the  transport 
and  saw  the  coast-line  of  France  disappearing 
in  the  distance.  Then  I  knew  it  was  true 
and  fairly  hugged  myself  for  joy. 

The  trip  back  was  an  excursion  for  us  war- 
battered  men.  All  of  us  had  been  gassed  or 
wounded,  and  every  man-jack  of  us  was 
seasoned  to  our  toes  in  modern  trench  war- 
fare. Rigid  training  and  the  hardest  of 
knocks  had  been  our  lot  for  many  months, 
so  that  the  life  of  luxury  and  ease  on  the 
transport  was  as  balm  to  us.  The  chow  would 
have  satisfied  the  palate  of  a  millionaire. 
Our  menu  included  turkey,  chicken,  pie  and 
cake.     And  that  pie  was  wonderful;   I  ate  a 


214    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

whole  one  at  every  meal.  During  my  nine 
months  in  France,  I  hadn't  even  caught 
sight  of  a  pie.  Every  afternoon  we  were 
treated  to  a  movie  show  aboard  the  transport, 
and  again  we  saw  the  friendly  faces  of  Douglas 
Fairbanks,  Charley  Chaplin  and  Mary 
Pickford. 

Many  of  us  could  not  restrain  our  tears 
when  we  sighted  the  coast-line  of  good  old 
Yankeedom.  All  of  us  had  gone  over  to 
France  prepared  to  die  for  our  country,  and 
never  expected  to  see  America  again.  Yet 
there  it  was  looming  up  on  the  horizon. 

When  we  reached  New  York  harbor,  April 
28,  1918,  our  transport  was  guided  to  the 
transport  docks  and  remained  there  all  night, 
the  next  day  we  were  taken  to  Fort  Jay, 
Governor's  Island,  and  that  evening  we  were 
allowed  to  go  into  New  York.  The  following 
day  we  paraded  up  Broadway — ^good  old 
Broadway,  the  best  thoroughfare  in  the  world. 
We  were  greeted  by  the  Mayor  of  New  York 
and  then  escorted  to  the  Stock  Exchange, 
where  we  were  given  a  royal  reception.     We 


BACK  TO  THE  U.  S.  A.  215 

were  dined  by  the  Bankers'  Association  and 
the  Harvard  Club,  then  our  unit  was  split 
into  teams  and  sent  to  different  cities  to  boost 
the  third  Liberty  Loan.  I  went  to  Philadel- 
phia with  eleven  others  of  Pershing's  men. 

I  am  happy  that  I  played  my  little  part  in 
this  big  war  by  firing  the  first  shot  for  liberty. 
I  think  it  was  fitting  that  I  should  be  sent  to 
Philadelphia,  the  birthplace  of  liberty  and  the 
shrine  of  that  wonderful  old  relic,  the  Liberty 
Bell.  Every  man- jack  of  us  who  came  over  is 
going  back  to  put  in  more  blows  against  the 
Hun.  We  feel  that  it  is  our  duty  to  do  this, 
and  besides  the  fascination  of  war  has  its 
grip  upon  us. 

In  Philadelphia  I  met  the  best  girl  in  the 
world,  and  now  I  have  her  to  fight  for  as  well 
as  my  country  when  I  return  to  France. 
The  Hun  peril  is  a  real  one,  as  every  American 
will  soon  realize  if  they  do  not  put  their  full 
weight  into  this  war.  The  boys  over  on  the 
other  side  are  getting  splendid  treatment, 
and  since  the  putting  over  of  the  last  two 
Liberty  Loans  there  has  been  plenty  of  food 


216    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

and  clothing.  The  Yank  who  fails  to  get  into 
this  war  with  both  feet  is  losing  the  oppor- 
tunity of  his  life.  I  will  not  rest  content 
until  I  am  fighting  with  my  battery  again 
over  there  in  France  on  the  front  line.  It  is 
my  burning  desire  to  send  over  many  more 
shots  for  liberty  into  the  Boche  trenches. 


TRENCH  TALK 

THE  war  has  evolved  what  is  almost  a 
new  language,  to  which  each  nation 
involved  has  contributed  lavishly. 
The  American  soldier  went  to  France  richly 
provided  with  a  store  of  slang,  to  which  each 
day  has  added  a  new  and  choice  selection  of 
terms  and  phrases.  Some  of  this  new  lan- 
guage is  clear  to  those  at  home,  but  much  of 
it  needs  explanation. 

Archie.    The  soldiers'  name  for  the  sky-pointing  guns  that  shoot  at 

aircraft  and  sometimes  hit  them. 
automatic.     The  Colt  45-caliber  automatic  pistol  with  which  our 

boys  are  armed.     If  it  doesn't  happen  to  jam  it  is  a  pretty 

deadly  weapon. 

barrage.  High  explosive  shells  fired  by  artillery  so  that  they  pass 
over  the  heads  of  an  advancing  or  retreating  force  and  fall  in 
a  line  in  front  or  back  of  them  and  protect  them.  A  box- 
barrage  is  one  which  is  laid  down  all  around  a  small  force  so 
that  it  cannot  move  in  any  direction. 

battery.  A  specified  number  of  pieces  of  artillery  which  operates 
as  a  unit  under  the  command  of  a  captain. 

Bertha.  Sammee's  name  for  a  big  German  gun,  from  the  name  of 
the  eldest  daughter  of  Krupp,  the  German  gunmaker. 

big  stuff.  Various  kinds  of  large  German  shells.  The  big  ones 
filled  with  high  explosive  are  called  crumpSy  from  the  noise  they 
make  when  they  explode.  The  ones  that  give  off  a  cloud  of 
black  smoke  are  called  coal-boxes  or  Jack  Johnsons.  The 
French  call  the  big  stuff  marmites  or  stewpots. 

billet.  The  barracks,  French  village  or  encampment  to  which  the 
soldier  is  sent  after  his  tour  of  duty  in  the  trenches,  supposedly 
for  a  rest,  but  usually  to  work  very  hard  at  some  non-fighting 
branch  of  military  work.  The  soldiers  usually  spend  one  week 
in  the  front-line  trenches,  the  next  week  in  the  support,  or  second- 

(217) 


218    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

line  trenches,  and  the  third  week  in  the  rest  billets,  after  which 
they  return  to  the  front  line. 

Blighty.  The  favorite  word  of  the  English  Tommy,  which  to  him 
means  England,  home  and  usually  a  rest  in  the  hospital.  It  is 
also  applied  to  any  wound  too  serious  to  be  cured  by  treatment 
at  the  field  dressing  station  or  field  hospital,  for  which  the  soldier 
must  be  sent  to  England.  The  "Blighty"  of  the  French 
soldier  is  Paris,  which  he  affectionately  calls  "Panam." 

Boche.  The  name  which  has  long  been  applied  to  the  Germans 
by  the  French,  is  an  abbreviation  of  "caboche,"  which  means  a 
hobnail  with  a  hard,  rough  and  square  head.  The  simile  is 
apparent.  Among  the  British  soldiers  the  enemy  is  generally 
referred  to  simply  as  "Fritz.'* 

bomb  (aerial).  Long  cylinder  of  steel  filled  with  high  explosive 
which  the  Boches  are  in  the  habit  of  dropping  on  hospitals 
as  well  as  military  objectives.  One  of  these  bombs  is  capable 
of  destroying  a  building  of  considerable  size 

bowlegs.     The  American  infantryman's  name  for  a  cavalryman. 

bunkie.  The  companion  who  shares  a  soldier's  shelter,  usually 
his  best  friend  for  the  time  being. 

butcher.    The  company  barber. 

caisson.  The  two-wheeled  wagon  which  carries  the  ammunition 
for  a  field  gun. 

camouflage.  Artificial  scenery  made  of  wire  netting,  covered  with 
leaves  and  branches,  or  of  cloth  painted  to  represent  scenery, 
which  is  used  to  conceal  guns,  roads  and  other  points  of  military 
importance. 

cannoneer.  The  member  of  the  gun  section  who  sights  the  gun  on 
its  object. 

chow.     Sammee's  name  for  food  of  any  kind. 

clicked  it  Getting  killed  and  so  needing  the  services  of  Holy 
Joe,  the  chaplain,  is  usually  referred  to  most  delicately  as 
having  clicked  it  or  gone  west.  After  the  ceremony  the  unfor^ 
tunate  is  sewed  in  a  blanket  and  after  that  he  is  referred  to  as 
pushing  up  the  daisies. 

communication  trench.  The  zig-zag  trench  which  leads  from  one 
line  of  the  trenches  to  another.  After  a  position  has  been  held 
for  some  time  these  sunken  roads  become  quite  numerous  and 
are  indicated  by  street  signs  which  exhibit  much  wit  and 
ingenuity. 

cooties.  The  soldier's  closest  acquaintance  and  worst  enemy, 
otherwise  known  as  trench  lice. 

Croix  de  Guerre.  The  French  war  cross  which  is  only  given  for 
acts  of  extreme  bravery  under  fire.  The  recipient  is  usually 
kissed  on  both  cheeks  by  the  French  oflScer  who  bestows  the 
decoration,  to  temper  the  extreme  pleasure  of  the  occasion. 


TRENCH  TALK  219 

deflection.  In  sighting  a  field  piece,  the  movement  from  one  side 
to  the  other  to  bring  the  piece  to  bear  on  its  object,  as  dis- 
tinguished from  the  elevation,  which  means  moving  the  piece 
up  or  down  until  the  proper  range  is  secured. 

direct  hit.  Used  when  a  shell  strikes  directly  on  the  object  at 
which  it  was  aimed.  The  phrase  is  quite  common  in  the  Amer- 
ican lines. 

dog  robber.  An  affectionate  name  for  a  soldier  who  works  for  an 
officer. 

doughboy.    The  cavalryman's  name  for  an  infantryman. 

duckboards.  Planks  which  are  laid  along  the  bottom  of  a  muddy 
trench  to  give  solid  footing.  Usually  two  boards  are  laid  down 
with  cross  pieces  nailed  on  and  this  simple  expedient  has  made 
it  possible  to  live  in  trenches  which  would  otherwise  be  nothing 
but  mudholes. 

dugout.  A  cave  excavated  in  the  ground  and  protected  above  by 
sandbags,  steel  plates,  etc.,  used  by  officers  and  by  men  in  the 
trenches  to  protect  them  from  shell  fire.  In  the  trenches  it  is 
commonly  known  as  a  "funkhole." 

entanglements.  Barbed  wire  strung  on  steel  posts  driven  in  the 
ground  outside  a  trench  for  a  depth  of  some  ten  to  forty  yards  to 
make  it  harder  for  the  other  fellow  to  get  at  the  men  in  the 
trenches.  Before  an  attack  this  wire  is  blasted  away  by  a 
barrage  of  high  explosive  shells. 

fajj.  The  soldier's  name  for  a  cigarette,  often  a  scarce  article  In  the 
trenches  and  the  first  thing  the  wounded  soldier  asks  for  when 
he  gets  to  the  dressing  station. 

firing  data.  The  instructions  as  to  elevation,  deflection,  land  of 
shells  to  be  used,  etc.,  given  to  the  commander  of  a  battery  of 
artillery. 

flare.  A  white  rocket  sent  up  at  night  which  illuminates  the  ground 
in  front.  It  is  the  bane  of  night  raiding  parties,  who  are  taught 
that  if  they  stand  absolutely  still  they  cannot  be  seen.  The 
least  movement,  however,  brings  a  blast  of  fire  from  the  machine 
guns  of  the  enemy,  which  is  apt  to  prove  fatal. 

franc.  A  piece  of  French  money  worth  about  twenty  cents  in 
American  coin. 

French  "75."  The  wonderful  little  French  field  piece  which  has 
a  bore  of  about  three  inches.  The  poilu  calls  this  piece  the 
"Little  Frenchman"  or  "Charlotte."  This  gun  is  capable  of 
firing  twenty  shots  a  minute  of  shrapnel  or  high  explosive  shells. 

gas.  The  general  name  given  to  the  various  kinds  of  poisonous  or 
tear-producing  gases  sent  over  against  the  enemy  by  means  of 
shells  or  from  cylinders  in  which  the  gas  is  compressed  and 


220    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 


released  from  the  trenches  to  be  blown  against  the  opposing 
forces  by  a  favorable  wind. 

gas  mask.  The  name  given  to  the  protective  device  which  the 
soldier  pulls  over  his  head  when  a  gas  alarm  is  given.  The 
soldier  breathes  through  a  chemical  compound,  which  renders 
the  gas  harmless. 

goat.  The  disrespectful  name  given  to  a  junior  officer,  which  the 
soldier  is  careful  never  to  mention  in  his  presence. 

**gone  west."    The  same  as  clicked  it. 

grenade.  A  small  bomb,  one  form  of  which  is  mounted  on  a 
stick  to  be  shot  from  a  rifle  and  another  an  oval  ball,  which  is 
thrown  from  the  hand.  The  latter  form  has  a  lever  which 
reaches  down  the  side  of  the  bomb  and  is  grasped  by  the  hand. 
At  one  end  of  the  bomb  is  a  pin  to  which  a  ring  is  attached  and 
just  before  the  bomb  is  thrown  this  pin  is  pulled  out  and  this 
releases  the  lever  which  flies  off  as  the  bomb  is  thrown.  This 
starts  a  time  fuse  which  causes  the  bomb  to  explode  in  a  fixed 
number  of  seconds  from  the  time  it  is  thrown. 

gun  pits.  Excavations  dug  for  artillery  to  conceal  it  from  enemy 
observation  and  fire. 

hangar.    A  house  or  shed  built  to  house  airplanes. 

hick-boo.  The  flying  man's  term  for  a  rumpus,  bombardment, 
or  attack. 

Holy  Joe.  The  usual  and  entirely  respectful  name  for  the  regimen- 
tal chaplain. 

incendiary  bombs.  Another  sample  of  German  frightfulness. 
These  bombs  when  they  explode  throw  out  a  flaming  liquid 
which  sets  fire  to  anything  burnable  within  a  large  area. 

kamarad.  The  German  soldier's  word  of  surrender  and  plea  for 
mercy.  It  has  grown  very  familiar  to  our  soldiers  on  the  western 
front. 

kiwi.  An  officer  in  the  ground  service  of  the  flying  corps.  The 
name  is  taken  from  that  of  an  Australian  bird. 

K.  O.    Short  for  commanding  officer. 

lanyard.  The  line  which  is  attached  to  the  trigger  of  a  field  gun. 
The  cannoneer  jerks  this  line  to  fire  the  piece. 

lead  team.  A  field  piece  is  drawn  by  six  horses  in  pairs.  The 
first  pair  is  known  as  the  lead  team  and,  of  course,  directs  the 
gun.  The  left-hand  horse  is  saddled  and  ridden  by  the  artillery- 
man known  as  the  lead  driver. 

lead  piece.  The  first  gun  of  a  battery  section  which  leads  the 
rest  of  the  battery. 

leftTe.  The  brief  vacation  given  to  soldiers,  which  they  usually 
spend  in  a  nearby  city  or  town.    The  soldier's  entertainment  is 


TRENCH  TALK  221 

usually  mild,  and  on  his  return,  when  his  fellow  Sammees  ask 
him  what  happened,  he  is  apt  to  reply,  "father  of  twins," 
which  is  his  equivalent  for  the  French  phrase  jxu  de  taut,  which 
being  translated  means  nothing  at  aU. 
listening  post.  A  position  near  the  enemy  line,  usually  in  a 
shell  hole  or  in  an  advance  section  of  the  trench,  where  men  lie 
quietly  listening  to  what  is  going  on  in  the  enemy  trenches. 
Much  valuable  information  about  enemy  movements  is  picked 
up  in  this  way, 

mademoiselle.  Sammee  has  quickly  picked  up  the  French  word 
for  "Miss"  and  any  girl  who  seems  attractive  to  him  is  known 
as  a  "mademoiselle." 

mess.  The  army  term  for  any  meal,  be  it  breakfast,  dinner  or 
supper.  If  the  cook  happens  to  be  afraid  and  the  firing  is  hot, 
the  term  is  apt  to  be  literal. 

mess  kit.  Every  soldier  is  supplied  with  an  aluminum  frying 
pan,  with  folding  handle,  which  locks  a  similar  dish  on  the  pan 
as  a  cover.  Inside  repose  a  knife,  fork  and  spoon  and  this  outfit 
in  a  canvas  bag,  together  with  the  army  tin  cup,  make  up  what 
is  known  as  the  soldier's  mess  kit.  With  it,  he  can  cook  himself, 
from  his  emergency  rations,  a  very  acceptable  meal  wherever 
he  may  happen  to  be. 

minnenwerfer.  The  German  name  for  a  trench  mortar,  a  short 
gun  of  sometimes  large  caliber  which  is  equipped  to  throw  heavy 
mines  or  bombs  from  the  bottom  of  a  trench  into  the  enemy's 
trenches. 

mitrailleuse.    A  kind  of  machine  gun. 

mule  skinner.    The  soldier's  name  for  a  teamster. 

munition  dump.  In  order  to  have  an  ample  supply  of  shells  at  hand, 
it  is  customary  to  bring  up  huge  numbers  of  high  explosive  and 
shrapnel  shells  and  pile  them  somewhere  near  the  artillery. 
This  dump  then  becomes  a  target  for  the  enemy's  guns,  and  air- 
planes, which  endeavor  to  drop  a  bomb  on  the  dump  which  will 
explode  the  whole. 

mustard  gas.  A  variety  which  the  Huns  take  great  delight  in 
sending  over  against  the  Allied  lines.  It  smells  like  mustard  and 
makes  the  eyes  water. 

No  Mail's  Land.  The  strip  of  territory  lying  between  the 
hostile  trenches,  which  no  man  owns  and  no  man  wants.  It  is 
populated  chiefly  by  shell  holes  and  barbed  wire. 

nose-dive.  An  airplane  maneuver  in  which  the  pilot  points  the 
nose  of  his  machine  downward  and  dives  at  his  adversary  with 
full  engine  power  on  and  firing  his  machine  gun  as  he  falls. 
Machines  have  been  known  to  attain  a  speed  of  more  than 
200  miles  an  hour  in  this  maneuver. 


222    THE  FIRST  SHOT  FOR  LIBERTY 

onion  shell.  The  flaming,  explosive  shell  which  the  Huns  shoot 
at  our  airplanes.  It  looks  like  an  onion  before  it  bursts  and 
smells  like  one  afterward. 

Panam.    Paris,  the  Frenchman's  Blighty. 

penguin.    An  airplane  pilot  who,  for  some  reason,  does   not   go 

up  in  a  machine. 
periscope.     The  eye  of  a  submarine,  a  steel  column  extending  ten 

or  fifteen  feet  above  the  deck  of  a  sea  snake,  which  is  fitted  with 

lenses  and  prisms  through  which  the  observer  in  the  body  of 

the  ship  can  see  what  is  going  on  without  bringing  the  boat  to 

the  surface. 
poilu.    The  universal  name  for  a  soldier  of  France,  which  means 

brave,  strong.     He  also  calls  himself  un  bleu  from  the  light, 

gay  blue  of  his  uniform. 

quirk.  In  the  slang  of  the  air  service,  a  pilot  or  one  who  operates 
an  airplane. 

reveille.     The  early  morning  bugle  call  which  turns  the  soldier  out 

^  for  his  day's  work.    It  is  about  as  popular  as  the  3  a.  m.  rooster. 

rolling    kitchen.     An  ingenious  stove  on  wheels  on   which  the 

company  cook  and  all  his  utensils  ride  and  serve  hot  food  to 

the  hungry  Sammees  as  they  march. 

round  of  ammunition.    One  complete  shell  in  its  loaded  cartridge. 

salient.  A  part  of  a  trench  system  which  sticks  out  further  than 
the  rest  into  the  enemy's  territory.  It  is  usually  an  uncom- 
fortable place  to  be  stationed,  as  it  is  a  natural  bone  of  contention. 

saw-bones.     The  regimental  doctor. 

sector.  A  division  of  a  trench  system  which  is  under  one  conmiand, 
or  one  which  lies  between  certain  points. 

shell  crater.  The  round  hole  dug  by  the  explosion  of  a  big  shell. 
No  Man's  Land  is  dotted  with  these  holes  and  they  form  use- 
ful havens  of  refuge  in  this  desolate  space. 

shock  troops.  Especially  trained  and  selected  troops  which  are 
used  in  the  first  line  of  attack. 

shrapnel.  A  kind  of  artillery  shell  in  which  the  case  is  filled 
with  pieces  of  iron,  bullets,  etc.  When  the  shell  strikes  or  when 
it  is  exploded  by  a  time  fuse,  these  pieces  are  driven  with  great 
force  in  all  directions.  This  type  of  shell  is  chiefly  used  against 
infantry  which  is  advancing  to  attack. 

shave-tail.     A  newly  app>ointed  second  lieutenant. 

slum.  Sammee's  name  for  his  meat  or  vegetable  stew,  which 
forms  a  frequent  item  in  his  diet  list. 

sniper.  A  crack  shot  whose  business  it  is  to  conceal  himself  in 
some  favorable  spot  and  pick  off  enemy  troops  who  show  them- 
selves carelessly. 


TRENCH  TALK  223 

SOW  belly.    The  universal  army  name  for  bacon. 

star  shells.     A  kind  of  reman  candle  or  rocket   which   throws  a 

white  light  into  No  Man's  Land  and  lights  up  all  the  surrounding 

country. 

trench  hehnet.  A  steel  hat  which  Sammee  thinks  is  comfortable 
or  uncomfortable,  very  large  or  very  small,  depending  on 
whether  or  not  he  happens  to  be  imder  fire. 

trench  knife.  A  broad-bladed  weapon  which  makes  a  good  tool 
for  digging  or  for  making  a  Hun  say  "kamarad." 

wagon  soldiers.  Artillery  men  who  ride  either  on  the  guns, 
caissons,  or  horses,  and  whose  lot  is  often  envied  by  the  infantry- 
man plowing  along  in  the  mud. 

wind  jammer.    The  obvious  name  for  a  trumpeter  or  band  man. 


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